


Hell on Mobius

by DoomFox



Series: Doomfox [1]
Category: DOOM - Fandom, Doom (Video Games), Sonic the Hedgehog (Video Games), Sonic the Hedgehog - All Media Types
Genre: Action, Alternate Universe - Science Fiction, Cussing, Father-Son Relationship, Found Family, Horror, Mental Instability, Ripping and Tearing, Science Fiction, Time Travel, angsty, but I'm planning on a happy ending
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-28
Updated: 2020-10-05
Packaged: 2021-03-05 03:55:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 10
Words: 38,434
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25168072
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DoomFox/pseuds/DoomFox
Summary: Hell has consumed the once peaceful planet of Mobius... and an unlikely duo must form to set things right.
Series: Doomfox [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1982599
Comments: 39
Kudos: 84





	1. The Survivor

**Author's Note:**

> So yeah, this is a wierd-ass crossover idea I had while at work, and it was too fun not to write about.
> 
> I also have a Tumblr https://theincredibledogboy.tumblr.com

The marine thought he had seen it all.

Over and over, for what felt like an eternity, he would fight against the eternal devourer on planet after planet, in dimension after dimension, timeline after timeline, until he won... and it all reset again. He didn't know how long he had been waging this war. A thousand years? Ten thousand? A million? Unimaginably more? It didn't matter. His crusade was eternal, and he would fight for an eternity more to vanquish his demonic foe. Save as many innocents from the wicked maw of Hell that he could.

The Slayer stood atop a blood-drenched ridge, surrounded by the corpses of demons he had slain moments before. He remembered an image he had seen of this world a few days prior. Lush and green, beautiful, populated by animal-like humanoids that reminded him of... A friend, he had lost, a thousand lifetimes ago. Now It was a blood-soaked ruin. Glowing magma drenched the land, vast green forests had been reduced to smoking matchwood, unnatural organic growths reached into the fiery sky, and the bones of billions of unfortunate littered the charred ground. 

The Slayer bowed his head. For all of his rage, all of his power, he was too late to save this world.

He racked his shotgun, and vowed vengeance for all of the innocent souls that had been devoured by hell.

.............................................

A fat boot stomped into an Imp's face, reducing the skull into mush and bone fragments. Without missing a beat, the Slayer turned and unloaded a salvo of automatic shotgun rounds into a flesh-wrapped egg-shaped machine. The thing staggered. In an instant, the slayer dashed forward, wrenched the flesh-machine's arm from the socket, and impaled the detached limb through the thing's torso. He raised a boot and sent the thing flying into a morbidly obese tank of a creature, which had previously been advancing on him with dual plasma cannons. Instead of causing any kind of damage to its intended target, the gluttonous beast burst into a fountain of flesh and metal, and putrid gasses steamed from the exploded organs.

"There are multiple targets behind us..." Vega, the Slayer's ever reliable AI companion, helpfully commented in his ear. In one fluid movement, the Slayer turned and raised a huge double-barrel shotgun - lucifer's Bane. His favoured weapon.

He couldn't help but take pause. A horde of Possessed, former inhabitants of this planet, shambled toward him. Images of smiling multicoloured faces, with big eyes and fluffy coats of fur, flashed through the Slayer's mind. He liked to know of a corrupted planet's previous people before he got to work. It granted him even more rage with which to tear the demonic invaders apart.

His pause did not last long. With a huge explosion of gunpowder and smoke, the shotgun blasted an enormous volley of shrapnel at the horde. Blood, flesh, bone and fur went flying, and the tormented souls of the possessed Mobians were released from their prisons of flesh.

The Slayer took a moment to crush a Demon's head with its own detached foot, and the fight was over. The heavily armoured human checked his ammunition reserves and armour integrity, noting that he was well stocked and at full capacity.

It was then that he heard the crying.

..............................................

"I am reading a single life signature close by..." vega's voice echoed in the Slayer's ear, giving the immortal human a measure of reassurance. " I shall set a waypoint. "  
The Slayer grunted, unable to offer any further verbal communication. His ability to speak had eroded an eternity ago. 

He advanced toward the designated location with his shotgun raised. The equipment launcher on his shoulder quivered with anticipation, ready to launch a payload of high explosives, freezing gases, or broiling flame at a thought from the Slayer.

He advanced slowly. Very slowly. The childlike sobbing sounded again. Images of memories from long, long ago, hellish combinations of infants and insects, flashed through the Slayer's mind. The shotgun remained poised and ready.

And for the first time in a very long time, the Slayer hesistated. The twin barrels of the weapon lowered. and the Slayer, so accustomed to instantly blasting anything that moved, hesitated as his sights fell on a very small, very frightened orange figure squeezed tightly into the ruins.

....................................................

The creature whimpered in terror as it laid eyes on the huge armoured space marine. The Slayer maintained his aim and shot questioning thoughts to his AI comrade.

"This specimen..." Vega said, reading the Slayer's mind, " is uncorrupted... male... Fox-like... and as far as I can tell, a child. "

The Slayer's shoulders drooped. A survivor? A kid? In the middle of all this? 

He simply grunted in recognition of Vega's reply.

The orange fox-child glared up at him in utter terror. The Slayer felt his heart drop a fraction. He destroyed monsters, he wasn't one of them.

"Please... Please don't hurt me..."

The fox babbled something in its own language. The Slayer shot a thought at Vega to process the language, which the AI did with gusto. The translated words replayed in the Slayer's ears, and he felt sorrow for the little orange survivor.

Slowly, knowing what he must do, the Slayer clipped his Shotgun back into its holster and did something with his hands that he was _very_ unused to - raised them calmly to show he wasn't a threat.

Unsurprisingly, it wasn't convincing. The fox screamed at the top of its lungs and, in a display of impressive bravado, launched itself onto the Slayer's helmet.

...............................................

Normally the Slayer would have instantly torn the thing off of his visor and done something incredibly violent to transform it into a pile of dead flesh. This time however, he needed to de-escalate the situation. And that was the exact opposite of his talents.

He had to fight the urge to reach up and smush the thing in his hands. It felt far too much like a Lost Soul gripping onto his helmet for his liking. Instead of crushing the assailant into demon-burger, the Slayer - as gently as he could manage - gripped the fox by the scruff of its neck and slowly removed it from his helmet. The creature continued to scream and thrash, battering at his gauntlet with tiny white gloves. Tears spilled from its eyes.

The Slayer was heartbroken at the creatures display.

_Sorry I look like a monster, little buddy... But I have to to fight monsters..._

The slayer shot a thought at Vega. _what do we do with him?_

...............................................

Before his artificial friend could answer, an entire platoon of Possessed Mobian soldiers launched themselves from the cover of the surrounding ruins and charged on the Slayer. 

Bolts of hellish red plasma descended on the green-armoured human like a torrential downpour. The Slayer, with his enhanced reflexes, took a look at the terrified orange fox-boy in his hand. a single word screamed out at him.

_Protect._

In a single fluid movement, the Slayer tucked the fox under his arm like a football and launched himself away from the incoming fire. He fired his jump boots and ascended into the air with a burst of flame. At the same time, he aimed his shotgun and fired on the horde of Possessed Soldiers. Fur and flesh caught fire as the zombies ignited, stumbling around and exploding.

The Slayer landed on another demon, this time his boots perfectly hitting the shoulders. The creature continued to scream as its shoulder blades were liquefied, until a boot stomped its skull flat with little effort.

The Slayer danced around his enemies, dispatching them as fluidly as if it was rehearsed, knowing exactly how and where to most efficiently and most painfully to end his foes.

And while he did it, he made damn sure that his tiny orange charge was well protected at all times.

He shot a thought to Vega.

"Confirm..." The artificial intelligence replied , "You wish to disengage now? Before mission completion?"

The Slayer grunted as he crushed a gargoyles' throat with his boot.

" Affirmative... " replied Vega, as a tiny black hole began to form behind the Slayer and his charge.

A tear in space and time opened behind the green-armoured space marine. 

"Ready to enter the portal?" Enquired Vega , mildly sarcastically.

The Slayer took the fox from beneath his arm and set him down, pointing toward the spinning portal while simultaneously firing his very large shotgun at the approaching demons.

The small fox stopped in his tracks, and watched the green robot as he relentlessly fought the aliens. smashing them, blasting them, stomping them, ripping and tearing them into shreds... Then turning back to the fox and furiously pointing toward the portal.

_Go! Get out of here!_

................................................

The fox stood stock still for a moment, considering his options.

He watched as the unstoppable green automaton turned back to the approaching monsters. He smashed and tore them into pieces, driving into each individual enemy like a cannonball. His speed and... efficiency... reminded Miles of another hero...

The fox watched on as the green robot blasted a huge alien in the legs... Then proceeded to climb the alien like a tree, and begin furiously stabbing it in the head with an arm-mounted blade.

It didn't take Tails long to understand that this strange green Mobianoid was on his side.

Fumbling at his waist, Miles attempted to unhitch a hip-mounted blaster. He forgot entirely about the swirling portal behind him as another horrifying creature hopped over a burned out vehicle to sneak up on the raging green-armoured figure. He shakily raised the weapon and frantically pulled the trigger.

The creature wailed as flesh burst from its body, staggering as hot bolts of energy vaporized it piece by piece. Tails squeezed his eyes shut with panic as he continued to pull the trigger, firing on and on and on and on... Until the blaster's empty battery whined and a huge hand grabbed him by the scruff of the neck. 

Miles squealed with terror, the empty blaster dropping from his hands... and a sickening sensation filled him as he was transported across time and space.

.............................................

The Slayer's fat boots smacked into the cold rocksteel deck of the Fortress of Doom, leaving bloody footprints as he circled around. He grunted as the transportation portal swirled to a close. He'd be back slaughtering the corruption soon enough.

"Let me go... LET ME GO!!!"

He turned his attention to the struggling bundle in his arm, as the fox squealed and patted at his gauntlet. He made to set the creature down on its feet... then stepped back in surprise as the single large bushy tail unfurled into two, which instantly began to spin rapidly. Like a fluffy little helicopter, the small fox rose to a hover above the Slayer, shooting in an orange streak into the ceiling-mounted structural supports. Terrified blue eyes peeked from the cover of the steel beam.

"Our little friend appears quite distraught," said Vega, a little too flippantly for the Slayer's liking.

_yeah, no shit Vega..._

Again, the Slayer spread his arms, palms out, attempting to signal to the little creature that he was no threat. Well, at least to him.

Frightened eyes welled with tears, but regarded the Slayer curiously as armoured gauntlets reached toward the flexible rubberized neck. There was a hiss, and what had, at first, appeared to be some kind of battle robot removed its helmet.

.............................................

Two pairs of blue eyes met one another as the helmet was settled onto a nearby console. The fox raised its head in fascination as the heavily scarred human gestured at him to come down from his hiding place.

Cautiously, timidly, Miles raised his head a fraction.

"You... saved me?"

There was a pause as the Mobian's speech was translated, then the human nodded. Slowly, the fox crept from his cover and fluttered down from the ceiling. Red shoes patted onto the rocksteel deck, and the curious little creature regarded the human with awe.

Then the fox switched his attention to the huge panelled windows of the bridge.

Before them glowing with flame, the once lush planet of Mobius burned. Magma flowed from deep wounds in the planet's crust, city-sized satanic symbols lay carved into the surface, impossibly huge tendrils writhed up through the atmosphere... there was nothing left. Just the corpse of another world consumed by Hell.

_Vega..._

"One moment..."

At a thought from the Slayer, the artificial intelligence shuttered the blast shield over the bridge windows, closing off the view of the dead planet.

It was too late. 

"Its... all gone..." The fox whimpered, trembling with the horrified realisation. "Gone..."

The creature said no more as his eyes unfocused. Finally, after days of fighting and surviving, his little body packed in and lost consciousness.

The Slayer approached the comatose figure sprawled on his bridge and keeled down to retrieve him. He looked down sadly at the scruffy and battered little fox-boy in his arms. This had happened too many times, on too many worlds, and all the marine could do was go wherever the corruption reared its ugly head and remove it from the universe like a cancer.

He glared angrily back to the now shuttered viewscreen. Another dead world to avenge.

Then, with heavy bootsteps, the Slayer marched from the bridge to see what he could do for the unconscious little survivor.


	2. The last Mobian

The Slayer was accustomed to treating his own injuries.

Thanks to the Divinity Machine he was immortal, and could technically live forever... but that didn't stop him from taking a beating. He had had to patch himself up so many times over his unending career as the ultimate destroyer of evil it was practically routine. 

He just wasn't used to having to be so damned _gentle._

Before him, legs hanging limply from the workbench, the orange fox child glared silently at his own tattered shoes, eyes bloodshot and unfocused. The kid had seemingly been surviving in the field for days - a feat that astonished the Slayer, given the extent of the planet's corruption - and had taken a beating of his own. Mostly flesh wounds... burns, cuts, missing fur... but the Fox's entire right arm was fractured. The kid had to have been running entirely on adrenaline to operate beyond the injury. The entire limb had been shaved from shoulder to wrist to better treat it, the bare pale skin horribly bruised and inflamed. The Slayer - as gently as a being dubbed 'the Unchained Predator ' possibly could - had tended to the damaged limb, and was now encasing it in what appeared to be an armoured sleeve. The brace, based on ancient Sentinel technology, would simultaneously heal the injuries while supporting and allowing some degree of freedom of movement.

The Slayer applied the finishing touches, powering on the brace. He gestured to the now completely encased arm with a grunt.

The fox jumped as though snapped out of a trance, eyes darting around in confusion as though he didn't remember where he was. The Slayer repeated his mute inquiry, and this time the fox looked to his bound arm with a small degree of fascination.

The human raised a questioning eyebrow. The fox, in understanding, obediently wiggled his now gauntleted fingers and timidly flexed the arm.

The Slayer raised a questioning eyebrow. _Better?_

The fox nodded lightly, staring at nothing with shellshocked blue eyes. 

"I... I'm all that's left..." The small creature's voice was barely a whisper, as though he were muttering to himself. "Aren't i?"

The Slayer nodded grimly. There was no point in lying to the kid. People didn't usually survive demonic outbreaks. 

Bloodshot blue eyes drifted to the floor. "It's all my fault..." The fox whimpered, tears welling. "All my fault..."

The Slayer frowned. The translation systems had to be misinterpreting the alien language. There was no way the kid could blame himself for the demonic consumption of his planet.

The human didn't dwell on it too long however, as the fox - the _child_ \- buried his face into his hands and began sobbing heavily in a very _human_ display of absolute devastation. The Slayer wasn't good at dealing with emotional stuff. He was really, _really_ good at breaking things and finding new and interesting ways of tearing demons apart, but that was about it. Still. He had a traumatised child on his hands now, and he had to do _something_.

The human glanced over to a portrait hanging on the wall of his study. His piercing blue eyes were met with the fully armoured image of his likeness, Lucifer's Bane in one hand... and a familiar brown fuzzy shape with long ears in the other.

Steadily, the muscular human set himself down on the workbench and tentatively began scratching at the base of the Fox's neck. Triangular ears perked and red-rimmed eyes shot toward the large human in shock... but there was no resistance. the fox leaned into the only source of reassurance he had left while the human gently scratched at the back of his neck, just as he had with a small frightened brown rabbit an eternity ago.

They were an odd pair, the now immortal Demon-slaying human and the tiny walking talking fox boy with the mechanical arm, but they were at least bound by a single unenviable fate. They had both fought, and survived, Hell itself. 

..............................................

_Fortress of Doom, Slayer's workshop, some time later._

The DoomSlayer might have been the ultimate Demon hunter - the Hellwalker, the Unchained Predator, the scourge of all evil - but he wasn't much of a tech head. He was capable of performing basic maintenance and field repairs on his armour and equipment, but there was definitely a limit to his technical proficiency.

But now, he had the smartest fox on Mobius living aboard.

Miles stepped back and raised his safety goggles, grunting in a very Slayer-esque fashion at his handiwork. Once upon a time the young fox would have been ecstatic just to _look_ at an advanced suit of alien power armour, but these days... He was somewhat lacking in the 'cheer' department.

Before him, the gleaming green form of the Praetor Mk2 stood inside of its armature appearing for all the world like a monster just waiting to be released from its cage. The fox had performed a full maintenance service on the suit, while the Slayer was off on one of his... expeditions.

The fox then turned his attention to a large energy pistol. He checked the weapon over, removing the power core and swiftly replacing it with a fresh one. ensuring the safety was on, he aimed the pistol and checked the sighting of the weapon. He retrieved a small tool from his bandolier and slightly altered the range-detector of the weapon, optimising it for long range. Satisfied with his work, the fox returned the pistol to its rack

The fox wiped sweat from his brow, and decided to take a breather from his work.

Since the planet of Mobius had been entirely consumed by Hell, the small orange fox had essentially become the Fortress of Doom's live-in engineer, helping maintain the human's equipment and weapons, as well as some of the systems on the ancient starship they called home.

It helped. Helped keep things relatively normal for the fox-boy. Helped distract him from the horror below and the... memories.

It was strange. Spending all day tinkering, fixing things for his friend... It almost felt like-

Nope. Miles squashed the memories before he could see them, hear them... _feel_ them...

It would hurt too much to remember.

The sound of powerful footfalls made the Fox's ears perk up, yanking him from his brief state of terror, and Miles looked up to see the giant green-armoured human marching into the armoury. The green armour was stained with blood and viscera, and several new burns and scars.

"Hi Big Green," the fox said tiredly, wearing a very small smile of greeting. "You got work for me?"

The human removed his helmet with a _hiss_ and tucked it under one arm, raising a weary thumbs-up to the fox. Miles slotted his goggles back over his eyes and hopped up onto the workbench. The Slayer entered the armour frame and began to disassemble the Praetor Mk1, assisted by his small orange companion. The fox smiled happily as he saw the armour had sustained damage.

Not because he wished his human guardian any harm... but because the distraction would keep him from... remembering.

..............................................

The fox absently tapped an armoured finger against the huge metallic desk, chin resting on his ungloved paw-padded left hand. He swung his bare feet in the too-high chair, red sneakers having become too tattered and... familiar... to continue wearing.

He'd have to build his own boots out of the supplies on board the Fortress. Maybe he would use the Praetor Suit as a reference.

The Slayer occupied a huge wingback thronelike chair, idly flipping through one off the old books he kept in the study aboard his ship, while Miles did his 'homework' - scanning through the human's tactical console, learning more about the exact nature of the monsters that had destroyed his world.

And figuring out ways he could alter the DoomSlayer's weapons and equipment to more efficiently kill them.

He scrolled through the consoles ' display, dark bags beneath bloodshot blue eyes on a lined face, grimly absorbing the information.

Imps. Small, fast, and agile. Liked to attack from all angles at both range and close combat. Modified sensors for the Praetor helmet? Perhaps a motion tracker.

Cacodemons. Spherical, floating creatures with cyclopean green eyes and enormous fanged maws. Insatiable instinct to feed. Easy enough to deal with, Miles could enhance the tracking systems on the Slayer's rocket launcher and micro-missile atachment.

Mancubi. Morbidly obese horrors with dual magma-cannons for arms and curiously soft underbellies filled with toxic and explosive gases. Perhaps he could modify the Meathook attachment of Lucifer's Bane, the Slayer's huge double barrel shotgun, to tear out the heart from range. The Slayer preferred his killing up close and personal, but another combat option wouldn't hurt.

Well, it would. Just not the human.

Gargoyles. Birdlike demons that flew on leathery wings and spat acid. Relatively harmless to the Slayer in the grand scheme of things. Maybe the fox could develop some kind of acid-resistant handkerchief the human could use to wipe his armour off with.

Possessed...

Possessed...

_Possessed..._

Miles paused as he swiped across to this particular demon breed. He desperately tried and failed to block the memories from flooding into his brain, and his chest began to tighten as he remembered smiling furry faces... and those same faces warping into horrors of shambling, gurgling flesh as their bodies were taken.

Familiar voices still screamed from the warped flesh, begging for release, through gnashing teeth and flailing limbs and blood and death and fire and agony and terrible writhing limbs reaching into the sky and... and... and...

................................................

The Slayer grunted and glanced over the expanse of his study as a keening wail reached his ears. He was up and out of his seat in an instant, fat boots stomping over the deck, as he understood what was happening.

Before him, situated at his study's tactical console, the small orange creature he knew only as 'Fox-kid' was rocking back and forth in the seat, arms clasped over his chest and choking as he tried to scream. Pointed ears and dilated blue eyes swivelled, focussing in terror on things that weren't there, and his mouth flapped open as his windpipe constricted.

The Slayer knew what to do. This wasn't Fox-kid's first 'episode ' since living aboard the ship.

Calmly, the human kneeled down before the fox and began lightly scratching the fur at the back of the neck. He snapped his big gloved fingers in front of the sweat-drenched orange face, attempting to grab the kid's attention.

The fox reflexively latched onto the human's muscular arm, desperately clinging on as if for dear life, panicked blue eyes attempting to focus on the scarred face.

The Slayer pointed two fingers to the fox, then to himself, before raising a tentative thumbs-up.

_Just follow me, okay?_

The fox nodded shakily, still trembling with fear.

while he had the child's attention, the Slayer began performing the same breathing exercises he had developed himself long ago, when he still lapsed into episodes like this. The fox gripped tightly to his arm but closed his eyes, following the Slayer's breathing patterns.

for a while, the fox and the human just breathed together, the burning planet in the curved window turning below, until the quivering ball of tattered orange fluff fell silent.

There was a sniffle, and a tiny voice whispered, "thank you..."

The Slayer nodded as big bloodshot eyes flicked up, staring into space.

"It's all gone..." The little fox whispered, staring at nothing. "Gone... I'm all alone..."

The Slayer cocked his head and considered. The kid looked so... helpless. He was extremely intelligent and the human had no doubt he could take care of himself, but after surviving this horror...

Maybe there _was_ something the human could do to show his little friend he wasn't alone.

...............................................

In one swift movement, the muscular human stood and lifted the fox into his arm, forearm beneath the ass for support, like he weighed nothing. The orange ears perked in surprise, but the fox reflexively hitched onto the human's shoulder like he was a big tree.

The Slayer stomped back over to his bookshelf and selected a velvet-encased book with his free hand, before flopping heavily into the huge chair and setting the Fox-kid into his lap like a child. 

Fox-kid eyed him curiously as the human flipped open the book, and tapped at the contents with a fat gloved finger. The Fox's eyes widened as he was met with pictures. Huge gleaming cities... lush green fields hopping with rabbits stretched far toward thick forests and tall mountains... strange furless people smiling as they lay on a beach... a platoon of soldiers in green body armour and silver helmets standing to attention... photographs. The Slayer was showing him photographs, from the human's home planet.

Miles leaned his head back and peered up at the human.

"Is this your world?"

The human nodded, flipping the page, the corner of his mouth twitching as a pointed ear tickled his chin.

The fox thought for a moment.

"Did you... lose everything too?"

The Slayer nodded grimly, a sudden hatred in his blue eyes.

Fox-kid chewed his lip.

"why do you keep these?" He said, sadly running a finger over the image of a small brown long eared creature that reminded him horribly of... He blocked the memory. "doesn't it... hurt?"

The Slayer nodded again. Then he jabbed a finger at the book, gestured to himself, and tightly clenched his fist.

The fox processed the action for a moment, before nodding lightly in understanding.

"Remembering... makes you stronger?"

The human nodded, glaring fiercely at his captured memories.

The fox looked down to the armoured brace that encased his injured arm, and lightly clenched his own hand. He wished he could be as strong as this human... it was all he could do to block out the memories of his own life to keep from losing his mind.

The fox stared through a photograph of a huge golden bridge suspended over a glistening blue sea.

"Is there any way to stop them?" The small Mobian whispered .

The human contemplated for a moment, and then shrugged.

The fox sighed miserably, reflecting on how familiar this strange faraway long-lost alien world was to his own. He has nothing left of his own planet, his own life... just memories that he refused to let back in, and a burning ball of demon-infested flame that hung below.

A word, an English one he's learned during his short time on the ship to express loathing in certain contexts, seemed appropriate right now.

"fuckin' monsters..." The small fox whispered.

He almost jumped from his skin as a snarl tore from the human's throat, and he jerked around in fear. Had he said something wrong? Had the word offended the human in some way? Fox-kid felt utter terror at doing anything to rub the DoomSlayer the wrong way...

then he realised. The Slayer hadn't growled with rage or offense.

He'd snorted. with laughter.

Miles observed curiously as the human wore... not quite a smile, something more akin to a grimace... but his beefy shoulders heaved up and down with silent chuckles. Apparently his small companion had said something amusing.

"Fuckin' monsters!" The fox repeated , gaining another snort, the scarred face stretching further into more of a smile. The mute human laughed silently, but infectiously. Miles grinned.

"Fucking demons!" He said, clenching his fists, "fucking jerks!! Kill em all!! Rip and Tear!!!"

The human was in straight up hysterics by now, thoroughly amused as the small fox swore like a sailor. He raised a hand and offered a fist. 

Miles curiously observed the familiar gesture, briefly remembering a blue hand in a white glove doing the same. He squelched the memory. That person was dead.

He tentatively formed his own fist and bumped it against the human's meaty paw. The Slayer wiggled his fingers, eliciting a small giggle from his companion, before affectionately ruffling the fox between the ears. 

Miles ' good humour melted away as he remembered why he was here with the strange human in the first place.

"At least we can fight them..." He muttered grimly, darkness pasting over his face as the human scratted between his ears. "at least we can kill them... make them hurt... right?"

The Slayer offered him a _big_ thumbs up at that.

.............................................

The Slayer continued poring over his album, reflecting on the life that had once been his. He wondered... if he could, knowing what he knew, the only one who stood between the universe and eternal damnation... would he go back? should he? His was not a life meant for normalcy. He was a weapon. Weapons didn't go drinking with the guys, or lazily watch the game on a Sunday afternoon... or spend time reading with their young son.

The human grunted as he suddenly noticed a limp weight on his stomach. He glanced down to find the small fox, twitching and whimpering, asleep in his lap.

The human set aside his album and, carefully, lifted the fox and set him down in the still warm space on the chair. He looked down at the tattered ball of fluff as he scrunched up in his fluffy tails, muttering quietly in his sleep.

_"they're... everywhere... must... kill them all... "_

The Slayer shook his head incredulously. Even in this state, the kid was impossibly adorable.

He was also a fighter. A technical wizz, extremely intelligent, survivor of Hell... and supremely traumatised.

_It's okay, kid... been there myself..._

So yeah, the Marine thought he had seen it all... but it wasn't every day an immortal destroyer of evil adopted a tiny space fox with a talent for weapons engineering and an emerging potty-mouth.

 _"I believe somebody is getting attached..."_ Vega's artificial voice quietly reverberated from the ship's internal communications. 

The Slayer simply shrugged, then stomped away to make preparations for the next mission. _Kid needs a name..._ he thought briefly, making a mental note to jot down potential nicknames he could moniker the child. Everyone in a unit needed a nickname, after all.


	3. Nuts

"Please confirm... _Nuts?_

_Yeah. I think it suits him._

The Slayer launched himself from the edge of a cliff, combat shotgun in hand, stomping an egg-shaped flesh-wrapped robot into scrap and gore. He turned and activated the weapon's rotary-barrelled automatic mode, pouring heavy shells into an entire squad of what Vega had dubbed 'Flesh-Eggs'. The corrupted bots flew apart in fountains of giblets and circuitry, the Slayer mowing them down like wheat.

"Please explain your logic behind this... _interesting_ moniker." Vega, unconvinced, sounded in the human's ear.

_'cos his tails are like a squirrels..._ the Slayer thought back, grunting as he tore away an arm, spun its previous owner around, and shoved the arm up where the bot's ass would be. The thing sputtered and whined as it died. _Also..._ the Slayer went on, reloading his weapon, _he likes fixing stuff. So like, nuts and bolts, you know?_

"I do not believe this is an appropriate title for our charge..." The sentient intelligence replied .

The Slayer shrugged, racking his shotgun. _I like Nuts._

If Vega had possessed a head, he would have shaken it resignedly. "Perhaps we should discuss this after our present objective has been accomplished..."

The Slayer shrugged again, before happily charging headlong into a flock of gargoyles that foolishly fluttered to the ground before him.

...............................................

"Nuts?" The fox replied quizzically, in much the same way his Sentient Intelligence guardian had down on the planet. The human before him nodded, grinning.

"an alternative designation for your person..." The SI said, sounding oddly unenthusiastic, "to compensate for the lack of divulgence of your identity."

The fox pricked his ears. "So you mean a nickname?"

"Affirmative," Vega replied, while the Slayer nodded.

"I already have a-" the fox began to say, but the words caught in his throat. He hadn't spoken anything about his past, his identity, his life, to the two strangers that were now his caretakers. He couldn't. The fox actively forced the memories of his life and world from his conscious, unable to cope with the pain they brought him.

Besides, he... after everything he had survived, he wasn't even the same person he had been before... _before_. Didn't even look the same, fur tattered and tinged with grey hanging from a skinny form, broken eyes that periodically focused on non-existent threats, buried in a lined face that barely knew how to smile any more. 

Miles 'Tails' Prower had died along with his world, and the husk that remained had one purpose - destroy the monsters that had taken everything from him.

A new life needed a new name.

The fox fidgeted with his mechanical arm brace as the Slayer flashed a quick thumbs-up and thumbs-down, eyebrow raised in question.

_So?_

The fox forced out the image of a smiling blue face wearing the same expression as the human, when it had coined his old nickname, in another life.

"Nuts..." The fox huffed, flexing his gauntleted hand. " I like it. "

...............................................

By Vega's calculations, they had determined that the child was roughly twelve earth years old. _twelve._ the Slayer briefly wondered what _he_ had been doing at twelve years old. Watching cartoons and eating candy probably, doing homework, maybe listening to grandpa Bill tell one of his old war stories... He definitely hadn't been inside a Sentinel weapons range, staring down the sights of an assault rifle that was almost as large as he was.

The Fox-kid - known now as Nuts - glanced up at the Slayer, grinning excitedly behind green goggles. 

"Like this?" Nuts said, clutching the comically large weapon in his hands.

The Slayer, kneeling behind the fox with one palm supporting his back, leaned forward and made Damn sure the rifle butt was securely braced against the kid's armoured right shoulder. Nuts had proven himself proficient with the Slayer's energy pistol... but the huge, excessively powerful ballistic rifle was another game entirely. The recoil might break the kid's arm if it wasn't for the modified armoured brace that still enveloped the damaged limb.

The Slayer gently altered Nuts' stance, making sure he held the cut-down rifle properly, then grunted. Nuts bared his teeth in anticipation.

_Vega?_

"Affirmative. Live fire exercise beginning in three... two... one...

................................................

"That was fuckin' wicked!!!"

Nuts briefly hovered above the deck with his twin tails, fists pumping, before setting down in his favourite position on the Slayer's shoulders. He happily patted at the human's head and kicked his booted feet as they walked down the deck of the ship away from the firing range. The fox-kid, ecstatic from the thrill of the exercise, happily glanced around at the ceiling.

"How'd I do, Vega?"

The Sentient Intelligence's voice emanated smoothly from the ship's internal communications in reply.

"You achieved an accuracy rating of eighty-seven point five percent, Nuts. Impressive performance for an individual of your age, experience, and stature. "

"Shit yeah!" The fox happily scratched at the human's strawberry blond hair. "That's what I'm fuckin' talking about!!"

The Slayer chuckled. In his weeks aboard the ship, Nuts had developed his own... colourful variant of the English language, which the human wholeheartedly endorsed.

His artificial companion was a little less enthusiastic, however.

" Nuts, I do not believe such vocabulary is suitable for an individual of your age... "

Nuts grimaced and rolled his eyes. "Jeez, sorry _mom..._ "

The Slayer snorted at the nickname coined for the overprotective intelligence, and raised a balled fist into the air near his head. The fist was quickly bumped by its much smaller orange counterpart.

The human hummed grimly. Nuts was seemingly a natural with weapons, and was developing a hunger for battle. It felt _wrong_ to be teaching such a young child to fight. Nuts should be going to school, playing baseball, getting up to the crap that normal twelve year-olds got themselves into. 

But one day he'd want to fight. Get retribution of his own. The Slayer could see it, in the faded blue eyes that drifted off into nothing, and routinely snapped into focus on threats that weren't there. 

The least the human could do was slowly train the kid to basic marine standards. For his own safety. And when he was old enough...

Maybe the ancient order of Night Sentinels wasn't so dead after all.

.............................................

"I believe the child..." Vega began, a hint of disapproval in the intelligence's tone, "has nutritional requirements that exceed 'Gulamis' belly-bustin' extra stuffed crust cheese and pepperoni pizza."

The Slayer grimaced and shook his head, chewing on a piece of said pizza. _Damn, Vega... you really would make a good mother..._

"I simply wish to provide healthy diet and lifestyle for our charge."

The Slayer shrugged, chewing his food. what was the point of having food replicators aboard if you couldn't program them with the good stuff?

Nearby, booted feet dangling over the workbench, Nuts was happily munching a huge slice of pizza. The fox swallowed and then called over to the Slayer.

"I learned a new one today!"

The slayer turned in his chair and raised an eyebrow. The fox grinned.

" _Asshole!_ " Nuts continued, wiping his mouth on the back of his hand. "Like _'You're fucking an asshole!'_ Right?"

The Slayer tried not to choke on his food, then made a motion with his hand, palm down and teetering side to side.

_Not quite, kid..._

Nuts shrugged, taking another bite of his pizza. "Eh, I'll get it eventually."

The human silently laughed to himself. Nuts had started cussing at first from lack of understanding of what the English words actually meant. Now he did it because he enjoyed the amusement it brought to his human guardian, and would occasionally show off new curses he had learned.

The Slayer loved it.

After so long of being alone aboard the Fortress, with just Vega for company.... It was nice to have something that reminded the once-mortal human of a normal life.

The fox on the workbench furrowed his brow, appearing in thought for a moment. Then he looked toward the reclining human and open his mouth to speak.

"Uh... Green?"

The Slayer turned in his chair and looked to the fox, another slice of pizza quivering in his hand.

The fox fiddled with his brace as he thought of what he was going to say.

"I... I've been thinking..." The kid stammered, before locking his eyes with the human's. "I... want to come with you. On your next mission... I want to go down there and fight."

The Slayer sat paused, slice of pizza comically wobbling halfway to his mouth as he stared at the kid. Setting the food back on its plate, he sat straighter and wore his most serious expression, shaking his head.

_No. Absolutely not._

The Fox's face fell as he understood.

"But... The training... I'm ready to fight!"

The Slayer maintained his stare, jaw fixed, ice blue eyes boring into the Fox's own. Nuts felt his chest begin to hike.

"It's my world!" He said, adrenalin begging to flow. "I have a right to go down there!"

"The Slayer's primary concern is your personal safety, " Vega's voice spoke from above.

"Then... what 's the point?!" The fox shouted, suddenly angry. "Of all the training?"

"We believe you are too young at this time to-"

"SHUT UP!! " the fox threw his pizza to the ground and planted his boots to the deck suddenly furious. "You're just the same as everyone else! _'oh, poor little Tails, so delicate and innocent, good for nothing except fixing our shit'!!!_ What even am I to you?! Some hobby? A _pet?!?_ like that fucking thing?!? " the fox jerked a finger to the portrait of the Slayer, holding his pet rabbit in one hand.

The Slayer remained silent, the expression of hurt unimaginable on that scarred face.

The fox didn't notice. His vision was too busy swimming with images of the horror that had taken his world, eyes darting madly over the floor.

"I hate you..." His voice hissed through gritted teeth, while his fists clenched and his limbs shook. Then he threw back his head and screamed at the study window, through which the burning planet of Mobius hung, dead. _"I HATE YOU!!! "_

Spittle flew as he screamed with such hate and rage, as though he could destroy the hordes below with his sheer will, tiny body shaking with anger and blue eyes filled with the need for vengeance.

The Slayer remained as still as a statue, looking sadly upon this poor child who had seen his world devoured by hell.

Nuts briefly scanned over the human's face, before turning and storming from the room.

Deafening silence enveloped the study, before Vega intervened.

"You wish not to pursue?"

The Slayer shook his head. _Kid needs space. Just monitor him._

"Affirmative."

..............................................

The dark halls of the Fortress of Doom, decorated with murals and portraits and huge stone effigies of Sentinel Warriors, silently hummed with the power coursing throughout the ship. All was quiet in the deserted warship, save for a child's small weeping sounding from the among the ceiling's structural beams. 

_Stupid stupid stupid._

Miles clutched his hands to his chest as he struggled to breathe, his limbs tingling, stars dancing in his eyes as he felt himself slipping.

_Breathe. Breathe. Breathe._

Memories were flashing through his skull, of his life before, and he desperately tried to shut them out. He couldn't afford to remember them, couldn't let himself feel that pain... that loss...

That guilt.

His heart rate continued to increase as he slipped even more. He banged his head against the hull behind him and screwed his eyes shut, focusing only on breathing and forcing his mind blank. He shouldn't have run away. Now there was nobody to help. No Green, no Vega, no Sonic...

_Sonic..._

Fat tears wept from his eyes as the name, accompanied by the face of the cocky blue hedgehog, flashed through his skull. He choked on his sobs as other names and faces came crashing back.

_Amy. Knuckles. Sticks. Shadow. Rouge. Vector. Espio..._

More names popped in his brain, and he felt himself sliding into an abyss that he would never emerge from. All of these people. His friends. His world. All dead. He'd seen it. Seen each hero succumb to the ravenous beasts that consumed the land beneath a sky of fire and blood. 

He remembered his brother's voice, pained as the hedgehog desperately fought a huge flame-wreathed monster with blades for arms and molten pits for eyes, yelling at the fox to run.

He remembered a red echidna smashing the heads of spiky brown creatures into pulp, before there was a flash, and then nothing but charred bone and glass.

He remembered a shambling mass of flesh, that moments earlier had been a sweet pink hedgehog girl, gurgling with grotesque limbs outstretched, begging him to end her.

He remembered pulling the trigger. And running.

And he kept running. He ran, flew, scrambled, fought and survived with whatever he could find, days melding together in a blind panic, somehow the only one to live through the horror as the world was consumed and billions perished.

It all exploded around his brain as he rocked back and forth, choking on his screams, in the rafters of the ship.

Slowly, far, far too slowly, his terrors began to ease and he settled into a less volatile weeping of despair. Hands smashed into his face, leaking tears and moaning in pain.

He couldn't do this. He couldn't allow himself to _be_ this person any more. Miles 'Tails' Prower, genius inventor, plucky sidekick... pitiful coward and _traitor..._ had to be buried. With the rest of Mobius.

With every ounce of effort and concentration he could muster, the fox forced every memory of Miles Prower deep, deep into the dark recesses of his brain, where the wretch could be forgotten. He forced himself to sever every memory of that... _other fox_ , and raised his new identity around him like a shield.

_WHO AM I?!?_

Nuts. Resident engineer and weaponsmith aboard the Fortress of Doom, mighty warship of the Night Sentinels.

_Who am I?_

Nuts. Assistant to the DoomSlayer himself, long may he Rip and Tear.

_who... am I..._

Nuts. Night Sentinel initiate and survivor of Hell, whose sole purpose was to bring death to the legions of the Doomed. 

_"Who... am... I..."_

..............................................

The Slayer was finally drifting off to sleep in his usual chair beside the bookshelf, when he noticed a small weight clamber between his arms and settle on his lap. The human looked down, expecting to find a sullen little fox... but instead the kid was beaming, grinning up at the Slayer in a way he hadn't before. childlike and eager, ears perked, blue eyes staring up in wonder.

"Hi, Green!" The fox chirped happily, as though his earlier breakdown had never occurred, "want me to read to you again?"

The Slayer contemplated for a moment, before grinning and affectionately scratching the kid between the ears. The fox beamed and snuggled back into his guardian's torso as the human selected a book for them to read, and placed it in his hands.

"I learned a new one today!" The fox went on, flipping open the book, " _Asshole!_ As in, _'You're a fucking asshole!!'_ Right?"

The Slayer shook his head and smiled, offering the kid a big thumbs-up.

Nuts the Fox grinned absently as he turned his attention to the book in his hands and began to read aloud. Meanwhile, behind the blue eyes, Miles Prower tucked himself away into the dark recesses of his brain and tried to forget... everything.


	4. Blascowickz

It had been months. The limb should have been close to fully healed by now, but whatever had caused the injury in the first place hadn't just left physical damage. The arm had been infected with a degree of demonic energy, causing cellular decay that meant the arm would never fully heal. The fox would be wearing the arm brace for the rest of his life.

Fortunately he enjoyed tinkering, and had made several modifications to the device himself. Enhanced servos entitled the arm with more strength than it normally would have possessed, and additional armour had been crafted around the gauntlet. A thick pauldron had been affixed to the shoulder, which served to absorb the recoil from the arsenal of larger two-handed weapons the fox had been trained to wield in his months aboard the ship.

With the modified brace, combined with the thick knee-high studded boots the fox had built himself and the bandoliers filled with tools and equipment, the fox was beginning to resemble a fluffy mini-Slayer himself.

The Slayer couldn't help but feel proud of his apprentice as he watched the alien fox-boy stripping a heavy assault rifle, taking apart the weapon and reassembling it as fast as any Marine. 

Then the fox hissed in pain, gripping at his braced arm.

The Slayer stood and began to approach, with concern for his charge, when Nuts turned his attention to the human and offered a meek grin.

"It's okay, Green... " the apprentice said, stretching and rotating his arm, "Bolts is just giving me some jip, that's all..."

The Slayer chuckled. Bolts. The kid had named his arm _Bolts._

Nuts and Bolts. The Slayer appreciated the dumb humour.

Besides, the arm was as much a part of the kid now as the Slayer's own Praetor Suit.

Nuts had come on in great strides in his time under the Slayer's training. Where once had cowered a small, frightened, tattered bundle of orange fuzz, now stood a whipcord-thin, lean-muscled Sentinel recruit.

The Slayer was slowly training the fox in the ways of fighting Hellspawn, and had been surprised by the kid's abilities. 

On the range, Nuts had become an extremely proficient marksman, despite training with weapons designed for human standards. To compensate for his short stature, Nuts had developed his own downsized versions of the Slayer's rifles and combat shotgun, and carried an energy pistol and blade in his belt wherever he went.

But guns weren't everything.

Fighting the forces of Hell didn't just require being a good marksman. You could be as accurate as you liked, but if you stood still even for a moment, you were dead. Demonic combat required a _lot_ of moving, jumping, ducking, diving and taking your shots when you could. It was less combat and more art form, that became something close to a dance when mastered. You just had to be fast.

And Nuts was fast. _Incredibly_ fast.

Using his twin tails, with terrestrial gravity and air resistance, Vega had estimated that the fox could reach speeds of roughly seven-hundred miles per hour - just short of Mach 1. The Slayer had been astonished, and even Vega had been unable to figure out the physics behind the incredible fox-boy's flight abilities.

And he was strong. Despite his small frame, Nuts was capable of wielding full-size firearms and lifting heavy weights while flying. 

Combining all of his abilities, Nuts would make for an unexpectedly proficient demon Hunter... once he became old enough to fight.

Seventeen. The Slayer had decided on seventeen. The same age he himself had joined the UAC Marine Corps, a million lifetimes ago.

Then he would be ready to exact his vengeance.

The Slayer hummed as he looked back to his tactical console. This current invasion was bewildering. No matter how many missions, no matter how many demons he slaughtered or Gore Nests he tore apart... there was just no stopping them. They couldn't even determine the origin of the invasion. It looked as though the slayer would have to destroy each and every demon one by one to rid this world of the evil that had consumed it.

He grunted and flicked off the console. If that's what it took, that's what he'd do.

He would continue his scans later. Right now he had some... business to take care of.

_let the kid know what time it is, Vega..._

Vega's smooth artificial voice emanated from above. "Nuts..."

The fox perked his ears and looked around at the ceiling, while the Slayer went to retrieve the required tools. "what's up, Vega?"

"The Slayer wishes to remind you of the... other duty you have scheduled today..."

The fox cocked his head and frowned. "Other duty? What-"

He was cut off by a harsh buzzing. Startled, the fox jerked around searching for the source of the disturbance... to find the Slayer, with an evil grin on his face, wielding some kind of electric razor.

Nuts' ears drooped and he groaned as he realised what Vega was talking about.

"Great... I forgot about that..."

.............................................

A moan of despair released from the fox's throat as the Slayer carefully ran the razor down his back, clumps of orange fluff dropping to the floor. He grinned as he remembered his own first marine cut, the instructor wrenching the seventeen year old recruit's head around as Strawberry blond hair fell about his shoulders. He'd try to be a little more careful than that instructor. He owed the kid that much.

Nuts had reluctantly, but dutifully, shaved the rest of his body, groaning with misery for the entire time. The Slayer vaguely remembered Bessie, the family dog, being periodically clipped. He wondered if the old hound had complained as much as the orange fox before him.

It was a necessary task if Nuts was to become a Sentinel. He'd spend much of his time encased in close-fitting armour, which would leave no room for a thick full-body covering of fur. And besides - fluffy orange fur and fire-spewing demons didn't mix. The fluff had to go.

He powered off the razor and patted the kid on the shoulder, signalling that the ordeal was over. Nuts launched himself away from the Marine and shook himself off, dreadfully skinny without the thick orange coat.

The Slayer had been merciful. The kid had kept the fur on his head, neck, and chest, but the rest had been reduced to a near skin-level covering of fuzz.

The human raised an eyebrow as his apprentice shivered. _You okay?_

"Fuckin' _freezing..._ " the fox's teeth chattered as he rubbed at his elbows. " how do humans _live_ like this? "

In answer, the Slayer handed him a bundle of drab green fatigues manufactured from the ship's replicators.

The fox groaned as he took the fatigues. "I hate clothes..."

"The development of garments for the purpose of protection and practicality was an important step in human evolution," Vega chimed in helpfully, as the fox slipped the green shirt over his head. Triangular ears flopped through the hole.

"Yeah well... I guess we skipped that part..." Nuts stumbled as he attempted to enter the fatigues trousers, obviously unaccustomed to wearing pants. "spent more time getting smart..."

The Slayer raised an eyebrow. The fox barely spoke of his previous life before the demonic invasion, and if he did It was in very vague terms like his prior statement. The human couldn't help but wonder at the life the fox would have had if none of this has happened.

Nuts finished buttoning the fatigues' rear hole over his twin tails, then spread his arms unenthusiastically. "Well? How do I look?"

The Slayer offered him a thumbs-up, before approaching the shorter figure and holding up a metal chain, upon which dangled a pair of oval tags.

The human dropped the tags into Nuts' hands. The fox noticed that there was writing engraved in the metal.

"Nuts... Blascowickz?"

The human nodded and grinned at the improbable name... his true name, from another time when the Marine was still a mortal. His family name.

Nuts had loved the ludicrous name when the Slayer had divulged it. The human figured he'd appreciate this little surprise.

"Nuts Blascowickz..." The fox repeated the name, trying it on for size. 

"The designation is yours should you wish it," Vega said, channelling the Slayer's thoughts. "alternatively, you may inform us of your true identity, so I might manufacture..."

"No," the fox snapped, cutting off the Sentient Intelligence a little more harshly than he had intended. He dropped His ears and offered an apologetic look around the ceiling. "Sorry, Vega..." He looked up to the human and grinned. "Nuts Blascowickz... pretty fuckin' sweet!"

The human, who never tired of the orange fox's potty mouth, chuckled silently and held out a fist. The fist was bumped by the gauntlet of Nuts' mechanized brace, and he quickly ruffled the kid's head.

The transformation was slow-going, but the kid was slowly becoming a Slayer.

..............................................

"Agh, son of a bitch MOTHER FUCKER!!!"

Nuts cursed loudly at an unexpectedly harsh twinge from his right arm, dropping his wrench in the process. He slid out from his position beneath the plasma conduit and uncomfortably gave the arm a stretch.

"Bolts, I love ya buddy, but you're a pain in the ass sometimes..."

The arm brace didn't reply, having no intelligence of its own.

"Nuts, do you require assistance?"

Vega's voice emanated from the ship's internal communications, causing the fox to jerk in shock. One hand hovered over the grip of his pistol. 

"No thanks, Vega..." The fox replied, relaxing his grip. He retrieved his wrench and slid himself back under the conduit. "Just my arm is all."

"Affirmative. Please inform me should you require anything."

Nuts smirked. "Thanks, mom..."

He finished his work on the conduit, then slid himself back into the deck and stood. His fatigues hung from him uncomfortably. He was still getting used to being largely shaven and wearing clothes. He missed his thick coat of orange fluff.

Nuts slipped his tools back into their designated pouches and pockets and continued on his maintenance rounds, fat boots stomping across the deck of the ship's engine room. He hummed to one of the Slayer's heavy metal tunes currently running around in his brain. Metal. A genre of Earth music the Mobian fox was becoming increasingly fond of.

The fox marvelled at the engines of the Fortress of Doom. a crazy mixture of advanced technology, cogs, chains and gears, that drove the ship at speeds Mobian scientists could only dream of. Even Robotnik would be utterly outclassed by-

_Nope. Squash it. Squash the memory._

Miles... _Nuts Blascowickz_ shook his head, banishing the dangerously close memories into the back of his brain. He had gotten good at forgetting over the months. He could almost fool himself that he was a completely different person from... That _other_ fox.

The traitor that had unwittingly brought Doom to his world.

Nuts briefly ran a hand over the tags that now lay around his neck. His mouth tweaked.

_Blascowickz. Nuts Blascowickz._

The new name helped. Helped him detach further from the life and the world that were dead.

"Fascinating technology..." The fox grinned, observing the clanking and whining heart of the ship. "What do you think, Bolts?"

he looked down to the arm as he spoke to it. Again, no reply. He knew he was crazy for talking to it the way he did. didn't care. He loved all technology, all of his creations. The image of a bright red biplane flashed through his mind before he squashed that memory, too.

Nuts shook his head, rotated his aching right shoulder, and continued with his work.

" Y'know, Vega... " the fox grunted as he slotted himself beneath steaming brass pipes, tools clanking in their pouches. He selected the appropriate tool and got to work. "I never asked how this thing works..."

"Please determine 'this thing'," the intelligence replied .

"Uh, the engines? _Shit..._ " Nuts flinched as his elbow grazed a hot pipe, suddenly appreciative that there was now very little fur on his bare left arm to singe. "This is technology like I have never seen... how does this thing even move from point A to point B? "

"The Fortress of Doom was a Night Sentinel flagship and personal vessel of the Slayer during the Unholy Crusades." Vega replied offering a brief bit of context. " it is built around a core of advanced Makyr technology, which even I lack sufficient data to properly understand. "

"'at's 'unferting," said Nuts, wrench between his teeth.

"would you like me to continue?"

The Fox's ears drooped a fraction. "S'rry..."

"The ship's core produces enough energy to provide indefinite operation," the intelligence went on, not missing a beat. "It achieves faster than light travel through a means of temporal displacement, warping time and space as to counteract the effects of relativity, and provide near instantaneous interstellar travel."

"You make it sound like a time machine, Vega. "

The intelligence paused as he considered. "Interesting analogy. Yes, perhaps some of this vessel's capabilities could be likened to a time machine."

Nuts grinned as he thought about an Earth time-travel movie the Slayer had shown him. That had been cool. The fox had even thought to craft his own working hoverboard after watching the sec...

...ond one...

Time machine?

Among the cogs and pipes and gears of the ancient battle station's engine room, the inner workings of the fox's brain slowly began to clank and grind.

_No..._

Slowly, an insane plan began to form.

_There's no way..._

The fox jerked and banged his head on a pipe as he came to the revelation.

" _Ow, suck my nutsack!_ "

"Nuts, are you okay?" The intelligence's voice projected worriedly, as the fox began to scramble from his work space.

" _I'VE GOT IT!!!_ " Nuts cried out, eyes bulging and hands gripping his ears. " _SON OF A BITCH, I'VE GOT IT!!!_ "

.............................................

The Slayer, in one of the few moments of sleep that came to him, was dreaming about... rabbits.

The Hellwalker, the Unchained Predator, the only one to stand against the slavering hordes of Doom, liked to dream of rabbits. Brown, fluffy rabbits. Hopping around a field.

He happily sat cross legged while they hopped around him. His own bunny, Daisy, lay in his lap, sleeping while he lightly petted her behind the ears.

Peace. For now at least, the Slayer was at peace.

Daisy raised her head and blinked up at him with big black eyes.

_"Green?_

He smiled and wiggled his fingers in greeting.

_"hey! Wake up! "_

The Slayer frowned. The rabbit was suddenly on his knees, gripping him by the shirt.

_" Wake up! Wakeupwakeupwakeupwakeup... "_

Slowly, blurrily, the rabbit's brown face and black eyes were replaced by orange fur and blue irises.

..............................................

The Slayer groggily shifted in his chair as the fox-kid hopped from his knees and began to hover in the air in that curious way that he did with his twin tails, chattering excitedly and whipping to and fro like a hummingbird.

"I've got it, Green! I've freaking got it!!" The fox's eyes were positively popping out of his head as he darted around in the air before the human. "Everything we need.. This ship has _everything we need!!_ it'll take some major adjustments but by my calculations it should absolutely be possible!!!"

The Slayer shook his hands side to side while Nuts spoke at a hundred miles an hour.

_Slow down! Slow down!!_

The fox dropped from the air and planted his boots into the deck. He took a few deep breaths before raising his hand excitedly.

"I... I've figured it out, Green!" The fox looked on the verge of tears, as though he'd discovered the secret of the universe. "A way to... stop them for good! To save my world!! And not just mine but yours too! Maybe even every world ever destroyed by those bastards!!! "

The Slayer raised a very bewildered eyebrow. 

_I have no idea what you're talking about, kid._

The fox just grinned and hopped back onto the human's knees and grabbed his shirt, his orange face so close the cold wet nose almost touched the Slayer's. Wild, enlightened blue eyes bore into his.

"We go..." The fox said, barely able to breathe with excitement. "Back. In. TIME!!!"

The Slayer wore a _very_ bewildered expression at that.

................................................

_Mobius, Southern Islands... one year earlier._

It was another beautiful day in the Green Hills of South Island. Emerald green meadows, scattered with yellow flowers, ruffled in the breeze. Palm trees stood tall, animals and birds chattered and squawked, and lazy white clouds drifted beneath the gleaming yellow sun.

Then the creatures began to scatter, sensing danger.

Time seemed to stand still as blue-white lightening crackled over the meadow, building into a writhing gnashing tangle of electricity. Blossoming from the centre of the disturbance, like a flower in bloom, a swirling blue portal tore the fabric of time and space.

From the portal a visitor, alien to this world, stomped yellow flowers beneath fat boots as he hopped from the portal. Behind the armoured green giant, the transportation portal shrank and flickered to a close.

All was quiet as the visitor slowly observed his surroundings, one hand resting on the large shotgun at his hip.

From his shoulders, a smaller figure clad in green fatigues and equipment pouches fluttered to the ground with twin tails, staring around his environment in blissful awe.

"It worked..." The fox whispered, voice small and eyes wide. "It freaking worked!"

................................................


	5. Sonic the hedgehog vs Doom Guy

"It's all here... It's really all here.."

The Slayer, never one to take much pause, couldn't help but look around in awe as Nuts hopped from his shoulders.

The planet, just minutes ago a flaming ball of demon-infested rock... was completely and utterly restored.

The heavily armoured human found himself standing in a vast green field, filled with yellow flowers. The sun shone brightly above, gleaming from his dark green armour. Tall palm trees swayed with the breeze, and in the distance enormous mountains stretched from lush green forests, into a blue sky populated with lazy clouds.

The Slayer flinched in surprise as something nudged his boot. He swiftly looked down, to find some kind of tiny brown creature sniffing curiously at his foot. The creature looked up to him with big green eyes, long floppy ears resting on its back as it sat on its hind legs and stared up at the marine with fascination, little black nose twitching.

The DoomSlayer had to fight the urge to kneel and begin petting the adorable alien rabbit.

"It's... all here..." Nuts Blascowickz, the twin-tailed Mobian fox under the Slayer's protection, stumbled forward like a zombie as he took in his surroundings, mouth agape and eyes bulging as he absorbed the world he had seen devoured by Hell less than a year earlier.

The fox dropped to his knees, green fatigues blending with the grass, and began to sob.

The Slayer watched his little orange friend weep and looked back down at the alien rabbit. The creature had stood on its hind legs and begun patting at his shinguards, curious at the strange visitor. The Slayer took a moment to reach down and - gently, carefully, gingerly - lifted the rabbit into his arm. The creature didn't even resist, simply snuggling into the Slayer's arm and closing its eyes contentedly.

The human couldn't believe it. a corrupted world, restored. 

Well, not restored _yet_. 

The Slayer scratched the rabbit behind its ears and gently set it back onto the grass, the impossibly cute animal blinking in confusion as it was wrenched from its brief nap. The Slayer wiggled his fingers goodbye and turned his attention back to the fox-child. They had a mission to accomplish after all.

................................................

The Slayer stomped on over to the fox and gently knelt down beside his apprentice.

He lay a hand on the crying fox and grunted. The Fox's ears perked and his head swung around, huge bloodshot blue eyes wide and tears streaking his white muzzle.

The Slayer cocked his head and squeezed his companion's shoulder. 

_come on, kid. We have a job to do._

The fox nodded in understanding at the human's mute statement, and raised himself from the grass, brushing off his fatigues and adjusting his tool bandolier.

"You're right, Green..." The young Mobian sniffed, wiping at his nose with his black-gloved left hand. "We're here for a reason... I'm sorry..."

The Slayer mutely squeezed the fox's shoulder again, and then raised to his feet. The Mobian followed suit, standing to his full height... roughly reaching the Slayer's thighs, including the tips of his large ears.

"Nuts..." Vega, the Slayer's Sentient Intelligence companion, piped up at a thought from his human partner. "Are you ready to carry out our objective?"

Nuts clenched his fists and nodded, blinking the tears from his eyes.

"Yeah, Vega. Let's go."

with that, the fox-boy set his jaw and marched forward, heading for a trail that led into the green forests.

The Slayer grunted and shot a thought at Vega.

_Kid's a little more headstrong than usual, huh?_

"Well, I suppose he's taking after his father..." The intelligence replied, sarcastic as ever.

The Slayer batted at his helmet, before squeezing the grip of his holstered shotgun and stomping off after his orange charge.

..............................................

"Nuts, mission time is now one hour fourteen minutes fifteen seconds..." Vega chimed from the Slayer's helmet. "

"huh?" The fox stumbled over a thick root, wrenched from his stupor at Vega's inquiry. He blinked rapidly, still appearing lost in his surroundings.

The Slayer understood. He would feel the same if he suddenly found himself on his own restored Earth.

"You appear to be quite lost..." Vega continued, artificial voice emanating from the Slayer's helmet with concern.

Nuts rubbed at the back of his head and looked around the emerald green clearing the trio had found themselves in.

"Sorry guys..." The fox said, resting his thumbs in his belt, "it's been a while... and I've kinda been trying _not_ to remember this place..."

The Slayer cocked his head and raised an eyebrow behind his glowing blue translucent visor.

The human used his memories to fuel his rage against the Demonic hordes. Nuts had buried his, building a new identity around himself, as much protective armour as the Slayer's own Praetor Suits. And now, being back on a restored version of his ruined world... This couldn't be easy for the kid.

after all, no matter how intelligent he was... The kid was only thirteen years old.

"Are you sure you're alright?" Vega asked worriedly, the sentient intelligence's aparent maternal instincts on display.

Nuts jerked at the concerned inquiry, having been staring into space for a few moments. His gauntleted hand rested on the grip of his energy pistol as his ears pinned and his pupils constricted, a vacant expression on his face as he looked up at his human guardian.

After a moment Nuts closed his eyes and practised his breathing. The Slayer patiently waited while the fox had his moment, until the most recent addition to the Blascowickz family reopened his eyes and nodded.

"I'm fine, I can do this..."

The Slayer offered his orange apprentice a thumbs up, which was returned with a weak smile.

"Okay..." Nuts hissed through gritted teeth. "Think Tails, _think..._ "

_Tails_. There was that name again. The Slayer assumed it had been the fox's moniker before the destruction of his planet, but apart from the rare occasion when his mind was occupied the fox never referred to himself with the name.

Neither the Slayer nor Vega questioned it. The kid clearly didn't want to indulge them in his previous life.

The fox shook his head and snapped his fingers as though he had just recovered from a brain fart.

"I can fly... for fuck's sake, I can fly!" The fox lightly slapped his forehead and looked up at the Slayer . "How the fuck do you forget you can fuckin' fly?!"

The Slayer, even with his enhanced reflexes, jumped back as Nuts uncoiled his twin tails and instantly hopped from the soft grass into a hover.

"I'm gonna do a quick aerial recon of the area!" The fox grinned at him with pointed canines, hovering before the human like a fluffy orange helicopter. "I can do more from the air! Be back in five!"

Before the Slayer could react, the Mobian fox accelerated the spin of his tails and shot into the sky like a rocket. The human could only watch in mute exasperation and shrug his shoulders as the fox went off on his reconnaissance sortie.

"I still can't figure out how he does that," mused Vega, contemplating the fox-boy's strange flight capabilities .

The Slayer grunted and scanned the treeline, hand resting on the grip of Lucifer's Bane.

He had fought the legions of Hell far too often to let his guard down just like that.

.......................................

"Dammit, Egghead.... what the heck are you up to _this_ time?!"

The blue blur flashed along one of his favourite strips in Green Hills, pausing momentarily to check a wrist-mounted data pad. He wrinkled his nose in frustration, usual cheery grin now a frown.

"Tails buddy... something's knocked out my locator... am I getting warmer or no?"

_"You're close, sonic..."_ the chipper voice of the blue hedgehog's plucky fox sidekick crackled from his wrist pad directing him via satelite. _"turn to your North-west and keep heading deeper into the woods!"_

Sonic sighed. Deeper into the thick trees meant _slower_. The hedgehog didn't do slow. 'gotta go fast' and all that.

"Man, what I wouldn't give for a chilli dog and a soda right now... "

 _"How about a chilli dog flavoured soda?"_ the fox on the other end added helpfully.

"Oh my God. Tails, invent that."

_"I was jo... Okay fine, whatever. Just come back in one piece, okay?"_

Sonic's face relaxed into his usual determined lopsided grin, hands resting on his hips.

"Hey, I'm sonic the hedgehog!" He proclaimed confidently , "ain't nobody can keep up with me! " he crouched down into his usual starting position, before adding "be back in time for a game of Tomatopotamus 3!"

_'isn't that the one everyone hates? "_

Sonic shrugged. "It's different and slower paced than the originals, but still good stuff!"

With that, the fastest thing alive flashed forward, turning deeper into the forest, heading directly toward the source of the bizarre power disturbance detected not too long ago.

..............................................

Free. He was finally free.

After months of being trapped in the confines of a Sentinel battle station, orbiting the ruin of his dead world... He was free and flying in fresh air, above the beautiful green and emerald landscape of Green Hills.

Mobius. His home. Alive and fresh and fertile once again.

He increased the thrust from his twin tails and set his arms by his sides, making himself as aerodynamic as he could, and accelerated upward like a fighter jet igniting its afterburners. The thick fur of his head, and the green fatigues he wore these days, plastered to his face and body with the wind. The fox grinned as he looked down upon the restored world below.

Miles never thought he would ever experience this again. Feel this _alive_ again.

He still couldn't believe his crazy plan had worked. It had actually worked! The Slayer had forbidden it at first, understandably resistant to Nuts fiddling with his ship... but the more the Mobian had pressed, and the more Vega agreed with his calculations, the human eventually relented. 

Weeks of hard work ensued, the fox barely sleeping as he altered the Fortress of Doom's engines. The Slayer, who still went on his expeditions to the surface, would return and physically have to make sure his orange charge actually got some sleep. The human would deploy on an eighteen-hour campaign to hunt down some nightmare beast or smash some flesh-egg production facility, and return to find the fox in the same position, still banging out some calculations or working on some indescribable piece of equipment.

And now here they were. 

Miles smiled vacantly, tears brimming behind his flight goggles as he flew so high above his homeworld.

Then he snapped himself out of it. The Sentinel initiate had a job to do.

He slowed to a hover, taking in the landscape below. From his altitude he could see much of the surrounding environment.

His memory was hazy. After months of trying to divorce himself from his old life, it was ironic that now he needed to remember, he couldn't. He could theoretically scan the entire island alone in just a few hours.... But there was no way he was leaving the heavily armoured human alone for that long. He wouldn't exactly fit in with the locals.

The fox was snapped from his thoughts as a clap of thunder hit his ears. He looked around in sudden fright, not willing to be caught this high up in a storm. Lightening did bad things to flying objects.

But the sky was clear, the sun beating down, no rain clouds to be found.

The noise had come from below.

Nuts scanned the environment below and raised a hand to his goggles, heart in mouth as he began to remember what a sonic boom from the ground must mean... and then he saw it. Far below, heading for the thick canopy of trees... a streak of blue, moving faster than the speed of sound.

He couldn't think. Couldn't believe what he was seeing. His best friend, his _brother..._ back from the dead... it was too good to be true...

and then his heart stopped and he dropped a few metres in the air as a sudden spike of panic lanced through his chest. He recovered swiftly and grabbed the sides of his face as it occurred to him it really might be too good to be true.

The blue blur was streaking precisely in the worst direction it possibly could - right toward the giant armoured space marine Nuts had left unsupervised.

"Ah, shit..."

..............................................

The Slayer looked around at his immediate environment, one hand still on the butt of his shotgun, taking in the sight of beautiful green trees beneath a turquoise sky, his fat boots planted among yellow flowers. some old ruins stood nearby, covered with ancient aztec-lookong hieroglyphs. Instead of humans in the images however, spiky haired figures with pointed snouts and crooked tails stood doing... whatever crap it was that a planet full of pint-size alien furries did when they weren't being devoured by hellspawn. Something to do with jewels, looking at the images.

It was bizarre. standing on a revived alien planet, lush with life, that from his perspective minutes ago had been utterly consumed by Hell.

The possibilities of what Nuts had dubbed the 'Temporal Drive' were endless. If they could do this with every consumed world, go back far enough to prevent an invasion before it even happened... They could do it. They could finally win.

And all thanks to a twin-tailed alien fox-boy who was capable of reworking technology literally developed by _heaven itself_.

Who'd have thunk it?

...........…......…............................

"Oh Chaos..." Sonic muttered from his cover in the trees, "what the heck is _that? "_

He lay low and did his best to remain hidden, his blue fur contrasting harshly with the surrounding trees, as before him stood a huge green automaton, heavily armoured and scanning the environment. Luckily for him he was behind it, and it appeared to have not noticed him. Its hand rested on some kind of massive weapon holstered at its hip.

Sonic couldn't place it, but just the sight of the machine filled him with terror. Deep, primal terror.

He swallowed his nerves and whispered into his communicator.

"Tails... I'm at the place... and I have eyes on some kind of robot... I haven't seen this kind before, but it looks tough..."

_"Eggman design?"_

Sonic bit his lip and considered. "Unknown... but it looks like a freaking tank..."

_"hold on, I'll be over with equipment to take it out.."_

Sonic shook his head. This thing, whatever it was, was too dangerous. It needed to be dismantled immediately.

luckily, smashing robots was kinda his thing.

"No Tails... I'm taking it down _now..._ "

_"Sonic, are you crazy? Wait for backup!"_

"No can do, little buddy... I'll contact you when this is over... "

_"Sonic-"_

Sonic rapidly shut off his communicator and stretched his limbs, preparing for a fight. "Sorry little bro... no way I'm letting you anywhere near this guy... " the hedgehog set aside his fear and allowed adrenalin to run through his body, the seasoned fighter wearing a determined grin.

"Okay tough guy, let's see what you're made of..."

................................................

The Slayer was fast. Very fast.

His internment in the Divinity Machine, millennia ago, hadn't only made him immortal... The machine had granted him unprecedented power, and speed, and made the once-mortal human into a weapon of rage and terror that could stand alone against the armies of Hell. The only thing the demonic hordes feared.

He wasn't fast enough.

His long-ingrained combat instincts kicked in as he sensed something to his rear left, moving with intent, his grip instinctively tightening on his holstered weapon.

"I have detected-"

Vega was cut off as the Slayer whipped around... and a blue cannonball smashed into his visor with enough force to knock the heavily armoured human from his feet. The marine slammed into the ground hard, and blinked stars behind his shattered visor.

"Well you know what they say..." Came a smug voice from across the field, "the bigger they are the harder they-"

It's owner didn't get the chance to finish its statement as, with an enormous roar of fury, and faster than expected, the Unchained Predator rose to a knee, unslung Lucifer's Bane, and unleashed an enormous blast of smoke and flame.

.................................................

"Ah jeez!!! "

Sonic, the fastest thing alive, barely had time to react as the automaton bellowed a challenge and fired at him with the most brutal weapon the hedgehog had ever seen. He just about managed to exit the blast radius... but not before a slug from the weapon's wide spread nicked his leg.

That was close. Too close. How had the thing recovered so _fast?_

it didn't matter. He'd just have to fight faster.

"Well then big guy.." The hedgehog muttered as he hopped through the trees, "if it's a fight you want, it's a fight you'll get!"

................................................

_Hold still, you little shit!_

The Slayer angrily tried to keep the flashing blue blur in his sights, as it pinballed from tree to tree, unable to maintain a fix on the thing. He was accustomed to fighting fast targets, especially blood-totem fuelled demons, but this was on another level.

He took his chance, firing another blast of godlike fury from his shotgun.

He missed.

The blue cannonball hopped from a tree and smashed into his helmet again, causing the marine to stagger. With a snarl the Slayer swiped at the thing with his arm mounted blade, slashed using the shotgun's meathook as a bayonet, and all he achieved was a blue projectile to the torso with every lunge.

Until eventually be caught his assailant with a kick. Satisfaction filled him as the blue blur was punted like a soccer ball, slamming into the nearby ruins with enough force to crack the rock.

It paused for a moment. The human thought he saw blue fur, tan face, green eyes.

Didn't care. His blood was up, rage consuming his actions, and conscious thought was out of the window.

The shotgun wasn't cutting it. In a flash, faster than his assailant was prepared for, the marine holstered the brutal weapon... and in his hands materialised an enormous, multi-barrelled chaingun, pulled from the Praetor Suit's matter storage system.

His finger clamped on the trigger.

And the blue thing dashed away as bullets spat out at an enormous rate of fire.

...............................................

_"CrapcrapcrapcrapcrapcrapCRAP!!!"_

Sonic dashed between the trees, head down as high-velocity projectiles mowed down the surrounding vegetation. Trees shattered and bushes just disintegrated in the hailstorm, the noise like the rampage of some screaming beast. He had fought faster opponents, larger opponents, but this guy was _adaptable_

Where the heck had that giant weapon even come from?! 

He had to throw off the machine's aim. Rob it of its ranged capabilities. 

The hedgehog grimaced and leaned forward into another huge burst of speed, swerving to intercept his foe like a missile as the huge weapon began to whine down.

...............................................

The Slayer grunted with frustration as the chaingun overheated, having expended a large portion of its ammunition into scything down the surrounding forest like wheat. The weapon dematerialised in his hands as he made to switch to his plasma gun... But he was interrupted by a sudden blue whirlwind streaking around him.

The blue blur now circled him at enormous speeds, kicking up dust into a swirling tornado, severely limiting his visibility. He blindly aimed the plasma gun, until the weapon was knocked from his hands by the blue projectile. The assailant pounded into him again and again, battering and denting his armour, relentless impacts seemingly attempting to break the human apart through sheer attrition.

He roared with frustration and rage, and made to switch to his shotgun again... Before remembering what else he possessed in his inventory.

_Like fighting up close, huh? Okay then, I'm game for that..._

.................................................

Sonic skidded across the ruined clearing, the grass and flowers torn and covered with brass shell casings, smoke and dust filling the air. He continued to circle the still fighting robot, kicking up more dirt to obscure the thing's vision. He grinned as he realised it had stopped firing, and launched himself in for another attack. This was a battle of attrition now, and the hedgehog intended to keep battering the thing into scrap.

He spun through the air like a wrecking ball, right on target... And yelped as a monstrous mechanical roar tore from the centre of the whirlwind, and something vicious clipped the very ends from his spines. The hedgehog lost control of the spin dash, and tumbled end over end until he unfurled into a heap.

He hopped to his feet, rubbing his head.

"Jeez, how much can this guy take?"

The hedgehog prepared to launch himself into a spin dash before the automaton could recover... And paused abruptly as the smoke cleared, and the armoured machine stomped forward with a huge powered chainsaw in its hands.

The cracked visor bowed and the saw revved menacingly, the meaning clear: 

_come get me now._

Sonic furrowed his brow and the two combatants glared at one another, each waiting for the other to make a move.

They didn't get the chance. Before the fight could continue, a flash of Green and orange slammed down between the air and screeched a single command.

_"STOP! FIGHTING!!! "_

..............................................

Sonic looked on in bewilderment at the sudden newcomer, an orange fox Mobian wearing some kind patchwork military outfit.

A _twin-tailed_ orange fox Mobian. Now angrily berating the armoured giant in some kind of foreign language, his armoured right arm thusting a scolding finger.

_"The hell are you doing, Green?! I told you NOT to shoot at anybody!! "_

The armoured giant made some kind of indignant gesture, spreading its suddenly empty hands wide and releasing a grunt.

"I don't give a flying fuck who started it!!! What are you, eight?!"

Sonic watched befuddled, as _Tails_ bickered with the thing like it were a child.

How the hell had his brother gotten here so fast? And what was he wearing?

_"Sonic?! Sonic, please come in!! "_

The concerned squeak of the Fox's voice emanated from the hedgehog's wrist communicator.

"Okay, just don't fuckin' do it again! We're here to _save_ people, right? Not use 'em for freaking target practice!! "

_"Sonic! come in, please!!"_

Sonic was now utterly confused.

"Tails?!"

At the name, the fox Mobian before him spun around as though he had been shot at, ears perked and scanning for danger, one hand resting on the grip of a holstered weapon at his hip... and wild, crazy eyes looking the hedgehog over like a ghost.

_" Sonic?"_

" ...... S... Sonic? "

...............................................

"Sonic.... Its... It's you..."

The other fox sure looked like Tails... but at the same time, didn't. The face was too gaunt, too lined, shell-shocked eyes just staring into Sonic as though barely recognising him.

But the blue eyes shone with tears, twin tails flicked, and a voice that was undeniably Tails' whimpered as the fox slowly approached him.

"Sonic... "

Sonic didn't know what to do simply standing in a bewildered state as 'Tails' suddenly fell forward and wrapped his arms around the hedgehog in a tight embrace, and burst into heaving sobs.

" Sonic.... I... I never thought... "

_"Sonic? Are you there?!"_

"... Never thought I'd see you alive again..."

_"Sonic, please respond or so help me-"_

"Hold _ON_ , Tails!" Sonic awkwardly replied into his communicator as the other fox sobbed into his shoulder, "I'm kinda in a... _situation_ here..."

.............................................

The Slayer cocked his head at the display, as Nuts flopped into the blue creature's arms. His rage subsiding, the human now registered the strange, waist-high blue alien as a native of the planet... and right now a very confused individual.

"I believe our charge is acquainted with this particular specimen," deadpanned Vega.

_Yeah, thanks for the observation Vega..._

Nuts continued to sob while the blue creature appeared to chatter into a wrist mounted device. The Slayer thought he heard a familiar voice squeak in reply, but disregarded it. 

The human took a step forward to console his apprentice, but faltered at a glare from the blue creature. Looks like his prior opponent _really_ didn't trust him.

_Yeah, likewise buddy..._

The Hellwalker was still mightily pissed that the blue creature had, without provocation, attacked him, shattering his helmet visor... and knocking him down.

 _Nobody_ knocked the Slayer down.

_Tough little bastard, I'll give you that..._

"should I remind your apprentice of our mission objective? " Vega pointedly chimed in his ear, the Sentient Intelligence intentionally doing the same to his human.

The Slayer considered for a moment, sad to see his young charge distraught again. Nuts was a tough little cookie, and hyper intelligent to boot, but he was still a kid... and had been through so much.

The Slayer briefly remembered blond hair, sniffling... A small eight year old child crying for his Marine father who was set to deploy to Mars the following day. And would never return.

The human shook his head. 

_No Vega... I'll do it myself..._

...............................................

_" Yes, I know you're in a situation, Sonic! You've been radio silent for minutes!! Excuse me for being concerned about my brother!! "_

Sonic was about to bite back, but paused as the armoured giant stepped forward. He glared at the thing.

_no way dude..._

The automaton appeared to understand his silent temperament, cocking its head quizzically. It seemed to contemplate for a few moments, before reaching both hands to the back of its neck.

Sonic looked on as, with a hiss, what he had assumed to be some kind of battle robot instead removed its helmet... revealing a heavily scarred, stone-grim face, piercing blue eyes regarding the hedgehog with something like contempt from beneath brown-blond fuzz.

Yikes. Definitely not a robot. More like some kind of extremely angry hairless ape.

"I'll... get back to you, Tails..." The hedgehog muttered into his communicator, locking eyes with the armoured creature.

The fox clutching to him had quietened his sobbing, now instead muttering mostly unintelligible nonsense Sonic recognised must be some alien language. Possibly belonging to the creature before him?

"all my fault... All my stupid dumbshit fault..."

Sonic was about to make some kind of inquiry to determine just what the hell was going on... when a vicious, gutteral snarl came from before him. The hedgehog tensed, wondering if the armoured creature had pulled out its huge powered chainsaw again... instead, the thing's mouth flapped open, a look of intense concentration on his scarred face as long unused speech functions slowly ground back into use.

"Ngh... nghuhtsszzz..."c

.............................................

The fox went limp and released his grip on the hedgehog, staring back at the human in disbelief.

"Green?" Nuts whispered, tears staining his white muzzle "did... you just...?"

The Slayer scrunched his eyes shut in concentration as he tried to remember how to operate his mouthparts correctly.

"Mm... mmhishion..."

Nuts, ears pricked and eyes wide, tried to discern the meaning behind the gruff, hoarse slur of a word. The Slayer hadn't spoken a word in the year Nuts had been under his guard, and the fox understood such had been the case for an absurdly long time for the human.

"Mission?" The fox enquired. The human nodded, with an affirmative grunt.

Nuts took a deep breath and knuckled his head, eyes shut. 

"You're right, Green... we have a job to do... I'm sorry..."

The human grimaced, stomping forward and ruffling the Fox's head fur.

Off to the side, finally having had enough of the drama, Sonic stepped forward and waved his hands side to side.

"Okay, okay... Time out!!" The hedgehog said, eyeing the pair with confusion. "Can somebody _please_ tell me what the _hell_ is going on here?! "

Nuts and the Slayer exchanges incredulous glances. What the Hell indeed.

The Slayer nodded, helmet tucked under one arm. _All you, kid._

Nuts and his guardian performed their usual fist bump, before the fox turned back to face his lost brother.

"Sonic..." He said, his distress shoved hard into the back of his mind, hand resting on his pistol grip in his habitual learned fashion. "This is... going to hard to explain... But you need to believe me. The fate of Mobius depends on it."

Sonic furrowed his brow at the suddenly collected fox, who had transformed from a shellshocked nervous wreck into what appeared to be some kind of military leader. The fox spoke with a strangely tinged accent, as though he had spent a long time speaking another language and neglecting his own.

"Just answer me one thing... " The hedgehog replied, eyeing Tails' doppelganger curiously. "Are you Tails?"

The fox bit his lip and nodded solemly. "Yes."

Sonic, who had previous experience dealing with alternate versions of himself and his brother, had another question.

"Where... Are you from?"

'Tails' briefly glanced back at his large friend before locking his wild blue eyes with Sonic's green.

"We're from the future... " the fox replied, "and we're here to stop... it. Stop everything..'

"Stop what? "

'Tails' grimaced, baring sharp canines. "The end of the fuckin' world."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Had a lot of fun writing this chapter!
> 
> https://theincredibledogboy.tumblr.com


	6. Stop hitting yourself

Tails tapped at his console with frustration, angrily glaring into his communicator as though he could transmit his mood to the recipient on the other end.

"So," The yellow fox spoke into the device, "are you going to indulge me in this 'situation' you found yourself in? That was so important you had to run into an unknown energy signature and scare your brother half to death?"

There was a pause, before a very anxious sounding hedgehog crackled a reply.

_"I... think it's best we explain this one in person..."_

"We? Who else is there?"

_"uh... You'll see..."_

Tails frowned. "That's not exactly a sufficient answer, Sonic..." 

_"Uh, well... Y'see... gotta go! Be back soon!"_

"Sonic, don't you dare hang-"

The communicator bleeped to indicate the other end was dead.

"-up..." Tails slumped his shoulders and let out a sigh. Sometimes, Sonic was too reckless for his own good.

"Who's the older brother supposed to be anyway?" The fox muttered. He leaned back in his chair. At least the hedgehog was in one piece.

Presumably.

Still, now that the situation had been resolved, Tails could continue work on his... project. He kicked away from his computer station and coasted across the floor on his wheeled chair, rolling to a stop beside a workbench and grabbing a pair of goggles. He grinned as he slipped them over his eyes, appearing now like a fluffy mad scientist. Time to get to work.

...............................................

Power. Unlimited, incredible power.

Based on information ripped from the last stormed Robotnik facility... A machine capable of producing energy that could power entire _worlds_.

A single word screamed out at the fox as he admired his creation... Argent.

The bulky metallic form of a prototype Argent filter sat in the secure section of Tails' workshop, where he performed his most private experiments. Red energy, ripped from a parallel universe, streamed through clear tubes and pipes, processed inside the machine into usable, safe, limitless blue _power_.

Tails had calculated, that with this power... the jump in science and technology would be astounding.

And it all came from some unknown dimension, existing alongside their own.

Tails grinned as he performed his observations. Right now only energy could be transferred from the other universe... But one day soon, he hoped to develop some kind of inter-dimensional portal device, and send probes through to the other plane.

He paused as he gazed into the swirling red energy that fed into the machine.

It was strange, he thought, how it seemed to be calling to him....

Maybe he could enhance the power supply... find a way to tear open the gates right now...

He shook himself from his sudden daze. No, the filter was a prototype. Much more work would need to be done before any kind of experiments with matter transference. The fox set his data pad back in its designated pouch and shut the machine down... making sure to take a final, longing look at the seductively churning energy.

He almost jumped from his skin as his communicator crackled and a familiar blue hedgehog's voice addressed him.

_"uh... Tails?" You there buddy? "_

Tails held a hand to his chest and spoke into the wrist mounted device.

"Jeez sonic, you trying to give me a heart attack or something?" He replied irritably, "I'm working here!"

_"uh, yeah sure... sorry..."_ if anything the hedgehog sounded anything but sorry. In fact he sounded more inattentive than usual, as though preoccupied. _"Well finish whatever it is you're doing and meet... us... in the workshop, okay? It's kinda important..."_

"Fine, be there in a tick..." 

The fox flicked off the communication device and set his hands on his hips, hungrily looking at the refined energy stored in the Argent containment unit.

"We're going to do great things with this..." The young inventor whispered, "great things..."

..............................................

Tails hurried up the stairs from his underground lab and keyed the door, making sure the workspace was secure. Then he turned about and headed for his workshop, ready to chew out his older brother for his reckless behaviour.

"Well then, dude..." The fox said as he entered his workshop , raising his goggles, "glad to see you actually made it back in one..."

He trailed off as his eyes scanned past a nervous looking blue hedgehog... And up to a green-armoured giant, twice the height of his brother, hand resting on some kind of brutal weapon holstered at the hip.

The giant regarded the fox with surprise from piercing blue eyes set in a heavily scarred fleshy face, that looked as though it were chiselled from stone. The giant looked the fox over curiously, before the expression softened into one of... affection? 

What the heck had Sonic gotten himself into this time?

_"YOU!!!"_

so enraptured was Tails with the armoured giant that he didn't notice the other newcomer... Until a flash of orange and green darted toward him at improbable speed. Tails registered a brief image of furious blue eyes and bared teeth... before a powerful left hook impacted his face and sent him sprawling to the floor.

 _"YOU ASSHOLE!!!"_ Tails blinked away stars and went limp as a pair of hands, one black gloved and the other armoured, gripped him by the chest fluff and shook him angrily. _"YOU STUPID, STUPID ASSHOLE!!!!"_

"TAILS!?!"

Tails could only watch in shock, his face throbbing, as Sonic rushed forward and struggled to restrain the assailant. Tails recoiled in fear as another orange fox-Mobian, clad in some kind of military garb and a single armoured right arm, glared furiously at him with insane eyes and screeched in a combination of his native tounge and some gibberish language.

"What do you think you're doing?! what the _fuck_ do you think you're doing?!?" The other fox spat, wrestling in Sonic's arms. "You think you're smart?! You think you're so _fucking_ smart?!? You're a kid!! A stupid little _shit_ playing with things you don't understand!!!!"

Tails looked on in utter bewilderment, too confused at the stranger's wild behaviour to even register the pain in his swelling face. 

"Okay, that's _enough!!_ " Sonic, fighting to restrain the rabid fox, growled through gritted teeth. Sonic _never_ growled like that.

Tails shook his head, wide eyed and perplexed at the other fox's outrage.

"would you calm down?!" Miles managed to stammer, "I don't even know who you are!"

The other fox appeared to find this hilarious, suddenly grimacing wide and falling into hysterics, crazy eyes regarding Tails with condescension.

"Don't know who I am?" The fox giggled, finally wrestling himself free from Sonic's restraint. "Don't know who I am?! Well hey, check this out!"

The mad fox turned, and Miles watched as one large bushy tail split... into two very familiar appendages. He glanced in shock between Sonic and the fox as the twin-tailed Mobian turned back to glare at him.

"Guess who, _motherfucker?!"_

...............................................

"Sonic?" whimpered Tails from his position on the floor, as his hedgehog brother keeled down to check on him, "what's going on?"

"He says he's you..." Sonic grunted, glaring at the... other fox-mobian as he helped his brother to his feet. "From the future..."

The other fox retreated back to the armoured giant, seemingly having trouble breathing as the human kneeled beside him.

Tails shook his head with bewilderment. "From the _future?_

Sonic nodded bitterly. "I don't believe it though... probably some Eggman trick... you'd _never_ behave like _that!_

The other fox glanced back with an expression of... hurt... and as the anger softened, Tails felt as though he were looking into a mirror.

He rubbed at his aching face. What the heck could have happened to have turned him into... this?

The other fox drooped his ears and slumped as the armoured human knelt by his side and lay a hand on his shoulder, a questioning eyebrow raised.

"I'm... sorry..." The double whimpered, his voice a rougher copy of Tails' own, looking into the human's eyes apologetically, "I should have told you..."

"Scanning... " a smooth artificial voice emanated from the helmet tucked beneath the giant's arm, speaking in some foreign language. "Argent waves detected in our immediate vicinity. Underground."

"I... didn't want you to hate me..." The fox continued, looking as though he were about to burst into tears. 

The human squeezed the fox's shoulder before standing to his full height - three times that of the Mobian - and set his helmet back on his head.

"It's downstairs..." The double said, gesturing out of the workshop. "In my secure lab.. ."

"Wait, what?!"

Sonic and Tails watched in shock as the armoured human lifted the other fox onto his shoulders and stormed off under his orange companion's direction. The brothers exchanged glanced before trailing after the two newcomers.

............................................

Tails' underground lab was secured and protected by a thick blast door, locked at all times, that Miles had designed himself to keep his experiments safe. It was strong, built to withstand a nuclear detonation if need be.

A single boot from the giant and the door burst from its hinges and clattered to the floor.

Tails watched in horror as the man entered his top secret facility, his companion hopping back to the ground.

"Hey! You can't just-"

In one swift motion, the other fox retrieved some kind of energy weapon from his hip and pointed it at the two brothers as they moved to intercept the human.

"Please don't..." The fox muttered, wild eyes stopping them in their tracks. "I'd rather not, but I _will_ stun both your asses into next week..."

"Tails?!" Sonic gaped in shock, even he not daring to make a move against the unhinged fox. "are you _insane?!?_ "

"Psychotic," replied the fox, while Tails looked on in horror and confusion at the other Mobian responding so naturally to _his_ nickname.

"What... what is he doing?" Miles whimpered, mad blue eyes switching their attention to him.

The other fox grimaced, baring his canines. "What he does best!" Tails' doppelganger answered with relish, "breaking _shit_! "

As he answered, the harsh sounds of destruction echoed from Tails' secret lab, as the armoured human tore the Argent filter to shreds.

All Tails could do was listen to the sounds of machinery being beaten into scrap. Until the carnage stopped, and fat boots stomped back through the lab.

The armoured giant returned and took in the sight of the two brothers being held back at gunpoint with concern.

"Is it destroyed?" The crazy fox piped up, the pistol remaining where it was. 

The human nodded, and the fox closed his eyes and allowed the weapon to drop.

"it's done..." He whispered, "it's done..."

A terrible silence descended on the party, Tails wearing an expression of utter devastation at his destroyed work while Sonic glared at the newcomers. 

"Could somebody please tell me..." Sonic said through gritted teeth, setting a comforting hand on his brother's shoulder, "what this is all about?"

The armoured human grunted and the ears of his companion perked back up. The fox opened his eyes and glanced between the two brothers, almost looking _through_ them as he set his weapon back in his holster.

"Sure, kids..." He chuckled, a humourless grin stretching over his face. "Story time!"

...............................................

with the assistance of his AI companion, the Tails doppelganger explained to them everything. The nature of the war that would consume Mobius, the aliens they would fight, how the now scrapped Argent filter would have been the origin point of the invasion, how he had been rescued by the human...

Sonic felt as though he was leaving out some details, but if Crazy Tails really had lived through such a conflict... his unhinged behaviour made some sense now. 

The younger Tails looked as though he was about to throw up.

"I didn't know..." He whimpered, an ice pack clasped to his face, tears in his eyes at the realisation that _he_ would have been responsible for an inter-dimensional invasion has he continued his tinkering uninhibited. "I didn't know..."

"Tell me about it..." The other Tails grunted, bloodshot eyes staring through the table they sat about while his armoured companion hovered by his side.

Sonic looked the dishevelled fox over. Hard to believe the shellshocked, armed and armoured fox was a potential version of his little brother.

"Well, we've totally changed everything right?" The blue hedgehog said, patting his actual brother on the arm for support. "It can't all happen now because your big friend there scrapped the... thingamajig, yeah?"

Both Tails' snorted and shook their heads at the exact same time, looking at the hedgehog with the same condescending blue eyes.

"Actually, that's not true..." Tails whispered.

Tails nodded in agreement. "My work... _our_ work... was based entirely on Robotnik technology. He started developing Argent tech first..."

"I... we discovered it back at his facility in Chemical Zone five..." Added Tails.

"Prototype... basic stuff, but enough to work on... " agreed Tails. "Had ourselves a little arms race with old Egghead..."

"I guess we got it working first, huh?" Tails looked to Tails with big apologetic eyes, and Tails grimaced.

"'cos we're smarter than old _shit-for-brains..._ " Tails replied, slipping back into that foreign language that belonged to the off-worlders, "always have been..."

Sonic pinched the bridge of his nose, his head beginning to throb as the two foxes chattered with one another. 

"But why... " he said, looking back to the 'twins', "if it's so dangerous, why did you keep working on this stuff?"

The foxes looked at him like an idiot.

"Because..." Said Tails, talking as though to a child, "the technology... the potential...'

"staggering," finished Tails, lost in thought .

"with that prototype in there?" Tails pointed in the direction of his secret lab, where the remains of the destroyed filter still smouldered. "You could run every major city on the planet. For _months._ "

"And not just that..." Added Tails, leaning back to rest a boot on the table and folding his arms. "The ancient Argentians did _crazy_ things with that tech... Traversed the universe, created worlds filled with life... " he bowed his head and wore a pointed expression. "Cheated death..."

"Well..." Chuckled Sonic, wearing a lopsided grin. "Sounds like real swell stuff..."

The twins rolled their eyes at Sonic's usual nonchalant response.

"Sonic, can you _fucking_ take this seriously for once? "

"I know, right? "

Sonic spread his arms in mock surrender. "Okay then... little buddies..." He grinned, earning another pair of exasperated looks, "so what do we do next?"

Tails looked to Tails, who nodded at Tails.

"We find Robotnik..." Tails replied, leaning forward and baring pointed canines, "we find his lair, we smash everything... and we kill him. "

..............................................

A silence had descended over the group. Sonic stood with his hands on his hips, while the armoured human he had fought just hours ago nodded approvingly. Tails fidgeted with his hands nervously, while Tails continued leaning over the table, fists clenched, looking between the other two Mobians expectantly.

"...well?" He said, breaking the silence.

Sonic cleared his throat and raised an index finger.

"Uh... Tails? Can we have a word?"

"Sure..."

"Whatever.."

simultaneously, the two foxes scraped back their chairs and made to stand. Sonic slapped a palm into his face, and his ears perked as he swore the armoured human chuckled.

"I too find our current predicament... perplexing..." Vega , the human's artificial companion, chimed in as he recognised Sonic's frustration. "Yeah... thanks, robo-dude..." The hedgehog pointed toward the Tails in the military outfit and the robot arm. "I meant psycho-Tails over there... "

Tails drooped his ears sheepishly while Tails stood and rotated his braced arm. He looked up to the powerful human and extended a fist.

_"Be back in five, Green..."_ the fox jabbered in that strange foreign tounge, as the two traded a bump. Future Tails then marched over and followed Sonic out of the room, leaving his younger counterpart alone with the Very Large Space Marine.

Tails twiddled his thumbs as his doppelganger left with his brother, suddenly extremely awkward around the giant mute human.

"Uh..." The fox croaked, unsure what to do with himself. "...hi?"

The giant human regarded him silently for a moment... before a smile tugged at the corners of his mouth and he raised a thumbs up.

..................................................

"Okay dude, explain yourself..." Sonic rubbed his tired eyes as they entered another room, away from the human and... Tails. He shot a look at the fox who accompanied him. "You want to _kill_ Eggman?"

The fox nodded, hunger in his blue eyes. "Only way to make sure," he repllied. "Besides. Fat sack o' crap had it coming for too damn long..."

Sonic folded his arms and shook his head. He couldn't help but take note that Tails had his hand resting on the grip of his pistol. "That's not how we do things, Tails. You know that. "

Tails flapped open his jaw and looked at Sonic as though _he_ were the crazy one. 

"You gotta be kidding me..."

Sonic stood his ground. "Stop Robotnik, bring him to justice, yes... But I won't help you kill him. "

Tails laughed incredulously, turning away and flexing his braced right arm. He continued to chuckle, shoulders wracking as he giggled to himself.

Sonic glared angrily at the back of his head. This... lunatic... wasn't his brother.

"You don't get it..." The fox whimpered , voice cracking. Sonic raised an eyebrow at the fox's tone... and felt a stab of guilt as he turned back to face him, tears staining his white muzzle. Constricted blue eyes stared through the hedgehog with terror. "You just don't get it..."

Sonic's mouth creaked open at the fox's new temperament, as Tails leaned against the wall and slowly slid into a sitting position on the floor, knuckling his temples. Sonic watched as the fox's hands _shook_ and the shellshocked blue eyes flashed back toward him.

"You have no idea..." 'Tails' croaked, the horror on his face causing Sonic's quills to bristle. "What I saw..."

Sonic, thrown for a loop by the doppelganger's sudden shift, couldn't think what to say. Suddenly, the crazy, gun-toting armour-clad time-travelling fox before him had transformed into the hedgehog's tiny newfound brother, who he comforted on stormy nights when the thunder rolled and the lightening slashed across the sky, and the tiny kit was too terrified to sleep alone.

"I didn't tell you everything... " continued the fox, blue eyes staring into nothing. "I didn't want to... say it in front of..." He gestured in the direction of the workshop , where the younger fox and the armoured giant waited for their return. "... _him_..."

Sonic's ears drooped and his face fell as he understood who the fox was talking about.

"Everybody _died_ , Sonic..." The fox went on, eyes focusing on nothing, " _Every. Body._ I was the _only. One. Left._ "

The dilated blue eyes bored into his, and Sonic understood the weight behind the words.

He swallowed the sudden lump in his throat. 

"How... did you survive? "

The fox didn't blink, didn't look away, didn't even move.

"You told me to run... "

Petrified blue eyes simply stared into space.

"so I did... and I didn't stop...'

Sonic's heart broke as tears began streaming from the unfocused, terrified eyes. Horror bled from the fox as though from a severed artery.

"I'm broken, Sonic..." The fox whispered, voice hoarse and weak, "what I did... What I saw... It destroyed me... "

Bloodshot blue eyes locked fiercely with green.

"And I will do anything..." The fox said, gritting his teeth and tensing, " _Anything_ to prevent it from happening again..."

Sonic, humbled by the fox's admission, sighed and slowly eased himself down beside the armour-clad Mobian, forcing himself to remember that this kid was his brother.

"I'm... sorry, dude..." The hedgehog said, sat close beside his brother, "I didn't realise it was that bad..."

The fox snorted. 

"I... Don't want him to know..." The fox whispered, wiping his eyes on the back of his unarmoured left hand, "I'm damaged goods, Sonic... I don't want _him_ to turn out like me..."

Sonic raised an eyebrow. "You mean _Tails?_ "

The fox chuckled and wore a tired grin. "confused yet?"

Sonic nudged his arm with a fist. "Thoroughly..." The hedgehog considered for a moment before spotting a set of military tags hanging around the fox's neck.

"you never struck me as the army type...' The hedgehog said, "what does that say?" He enquired, gesturing toward the tags.

The fox looked down and frowned for a moment, as though he had forgotten about the tags. Then he chuckled, shaking his head wearily.

"My... name, I guess..." He looked toward Sonic, eyes pleading for understanding. "I... had to forget..." He rubbed at his armoured right shoulder, gritting his teeth momentarily. "Guess I was never really _myself_ after..." His face fell into an expression of sorrow as he stared through his gauntleted hand. "After everything..."

Sonic nodded, doing his best to understand his traumatised future-brother. 

"So..." The hedgehog said, "what did you go with? "

The fox took the tags in his left hand and the corners of his mouth tworched. 

"Blascowickz..." The fox said, with resolution. "Nuts Blascowickz... "

Sonic grinned at the strange foreign name. "Bless you," the hedgehog snarked, earning himself a glance of weary irritation.

Before the fox could reply, the hedgehog held out a hand in greeting.

"Well then, _Nuts_..." He said, wearing his best shit-eating grin. "Good to meet you! I'm Sonic! Sonic the Hedgehog!"

Tails... _Nuts_... stared incredulously at the Hedgehog... Before his face split into a tired grin and he took the offered hand in his gauntleted own.

"Sonic, huh?" The fox said, "rings a bell..."


	7. Extended Family

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This is a short chapter that I just wanted to get out. I'm sorry for any mistakes, I'm supremely unwell right now...

Well. This was certainly... Interesting.

Tails hovered nervously at the entrance to his workshop as, boots dangling from a workbench and back to him, a duplicate orange fox hissed as he fiddled with his mechanical arm.

Utterly bizarre. That this was _him_.

Tails awkwardly played with his hands as he approached his 'twin', noting that the shirtless fox was shaven almost completely free of much of his fur, lean muscle and... Scars... showing through the thin covering of orange fuzz that remained.

Miles coughed to grab his double's attention.

"Um... excuse me?"

The other fox reacted as though he'd been stung, whipping around and fixing Tails with a predatory look that could kill.

Tails tried to ignore the pistol in the fox's grip. That wavered with its sights pointed directly at his face.

The other Tails... _Nuts_... lowered the weapon and sighed.

"Oh..." He muttered, slipping the pistol back in its holster. " it's you... "

 _it's you._ he was talking to himself.

The two foxes eyed one another curiously, their present situation stirring their inner curiosity.

Nuts was the first to break the uncomfortable silence.

"What do you want?" The armed fox muttered.

Tails fiddled with his hands, ears flattened to his head.

"I just..." The smaller, younger fox gestured toward the gauntleted arm. "Do you... need a hand?"

Nuts looked at him incredulously.

Tails slapped his hands to his face as he realised what he had said.

"Oh gosh, I'm sorry, I didn't mean..."

Nuts just shrugged, ignoring the slip as he wore an uncomfortable expression.

"You... night not like what you see..."

Tails frowned, forgetting about his prior screw-up.

"If you're me..." He said, folding his arms, "You know I'm accustomed to treating field injuries..."

Nuts shrugged again, turning his braced arm toward the younger twin. 

"Don't say I didn't warn you..." He muttered .

Tails stepped forward and, under the direction of his future doppelganger, began to remove the arm brace. The mechanism hissed and clicked as it split open like a clamshell, and was set down on the workbench with a metallic clunk.

Tails eyes went wide as he took in the sight of the exposed limb.

Nuts grinned humorlessly. "Told you, huh?"

The pulsing, warped flesh of the exposed arm made Tails ' stomach churn. The limb was utterly hairless, the necrotic meat pulsing grossly. The fingers clenched arthritically, black claws curling into the palm.

"That's better..." Nuts said, utterly amused by Tails' disgust. "Love ya, Bolts... but it's good to get some air every now and again..."

Tails shook his head at his 'twin's nonchalant attitude. "What... Happened?"

Nuts shrugged, scratching at the flesh of his corpse-arm. 

"Pinky..." He replied, not bothering to explain exactly what that was. "fractured every bone in the thing... and passed on a dollop of Hell-energy as well. Never gonna get better. If it wasn't for Bolts here... " he patted the detached arm brace affectionately, "itd probably go full Evil Dead hand on me." He considered for a moment. "Still, then at least I could have a chainsaw hand..." He looked to Tails, crazy blue eyes locking with his as he grinned. "That 'd be pretty _fuckin'_ sweet, right? "

Tails shook his head, oblivious to the context of his twin's rambling. "I... can't imagine becoming you..."

Nuts' grin fell and he stared through his dead hand. 

"If I do my job right..." The other fox muttered, fingers flexing weakly, "You _won't_ become me..." He looked back to Tails with a haunted look in his eyes, and Miles could _feel_ terror bleed from the older fox. "Im... Kinda missing a few marbles up here..." He tapped at his head with a black-gloved finger.

Tails raised an eyebrow. "How... bad was it?"

Nuts looked away, apparently unwilling to pursue the current topic.

"...you don't need to know..." He mumbled, attention now turned to his tool pouch lying beside his arm brace.

"I'm not stupid, dude..." Tails pressed, noting the other's change in temperament. "I know you're not telling me everything..."

"No, I'm not..." Nuts turned back to face him with a scowl. "And be glad about that, Tails. You don't wanna be like me."

Tails chuckled at the... bizarreness of his future self addressing him with the nickname.

"Isn't this wierd?" He said, looking the older, more muscular fox over. "You and me talking like we're different people?"

Nuts shrugged. "After everything, we pretty much are at this point..."

The two foxes stood awkwardly, unsure how to continue talking to... themselves.

" I'm sorry I hit you... " mumbled the older twin, "You haven't even done anything yet... it's me who caused this whole mess.."

"Hey, I deserved it..." Tails replied, observing the other fox curiously. It was bizarre, like meeting a long-lost brother who had come back from the war. "If you hadn't shown up... If it really was that bad..."

"Still, you're just a kid..." Nuts replied, causing a chuckle from Tails. He was barely a year older than his past self. "don't feel right. Like... Punching my little brother or something..."

" I was just thinking the same thing! "

Nuts grinned. "Well, congratulations kid... Now you have a crazy older brother who runs around with guns and is completely _fucking_ insane..."

Tails cocked his head at the foreign word. " _Fucking?_ "

Nuts' mouth flapped open and a laugh escaped his throat. 

"do not..." He said, pointing at this younger 'brother ', "let Sonic know you got that from me!'

Tails grinned. "Oh my god, is that a swear?"

Nuts nodded. "Yup. This Tails ain't so sweet and innocent any more..."

"Do you... Know any more?"

Nuts' face split into an evil grin. 

"Listen and learn, my young apprentice..."

........................................

Sonic happily listened to the two foxes as they continued their little bonding session. He grinned as he older began to teach his younger 'sibling' in the ways of the potty mouth, Tails giggling with glee as his ears were privy to words that the twelve year old shouldn't be hearing.

Sonic chuckled. It really was like having two brothers now. He could live with that.

Bizarre that Nuts had been the exact same as Tails once upon a time.

Sonic sighed and left the twins to it. He'd have to kick Nuts' ass for expanding his younger brother's vocabulary... but the Hedgehog would let it slide for now. After everything, a few cusses weren't exactly a hanging sentence right now.

Besides... He had a hatchet to bury.

Hopefully not literally.

................................................

The Slayer grunted as he inspected his weapons, his entire loadout spread over a workbench in another part of Nuts... _Tails'..._ workshop. He had gone with a classic load - shotgun, chaingun, plasma rifle, rocket launcher... BFG 9000...

He wasn't sure if he was going to even need to use his weapons on the restored planet.... But it didn't hurt to be careful.

A long whistle sounded beside him.

"Wow... That's a lot of firepower!"

The Slayer flinched with surprise as he looked to see a waist-high blue Mobian beside him, looking over the display of weapons with raised brows. The curious blue creature looked up at the Slayer with eager green eyes.

"so, stranger... " the 'hedgehog ' went on, "You got a name?"

"This individual..." The artificial voice of Vega emanated cheering from the Slayer's helmet from its position on the workbench, this time causing sonic to jump in surprise. "Is alternatively known as the DoomSlayer. The Unchained Predator, the Hellwalker, The Eternal Crusader, the-"

"Okay, okay!" Sonic waved his hands and cut the Sentient Intelligence off mid sentence. "Jeez, I get it!" He set a hand on his hip and rubbed his chin thoughtfully. "Well then, Doom... Guy..." He grinned, " don't talk much, do ya? "

"The Slayer's vocal capabilities are extremely limited," Vega confirmed.

Sonic nodded. "Mute, huh? That's okay! I used to be mute myself!"

'Doomguy' raised his eyebrows as the Hedgehog signed something as he spoke, fluidly signing with his hands in the foreign language. 

"You know who helped me start talking?" The hedgehog went on, jerking a thumb across the workshop to the other area where the two foxes were. "My little bro! Taught me to speak. And now he can't shut me up!" The hedgehog maintained his friendly grin, but the green eyes bored pointedly through the Slayer's.

"He's like a brother to me," the hedgehog went on, green eyes not wavering for a moment. "So you take care of him, you hear? _Nobody_ screws with my little bro..." He raised an eyebrow. "Do we understand one another?"

The Slayer frowned. Was that... A threat? anybody who threatened the Slayer didn't usually keep their heads for very long.

The kid had some serious sacks. The Slayer appreciated that.

The human grinned back and nodded, raising a thumbs up. The hedgehog dropped his hostile attitude and extended a hand.

"Glad to hear it! " he said, "So, Doomguy... Good to meet ya! I'm Sonic! Sonic the Hedgehog!"

The marine took the offered hand and they shook in belated greeting. He was beginning to like this kid.

................................................


	8. Double Trouble

"Jeez, was old egg-for-brains always this hard to find?"

"Well maybe we'd find him quicker..." Tails replied, turning and fixing his double with bloodshot, tired eyes, "if you helped?"

Nuts shrugged, busy reassembling his energy pistol while Tails scanned his monitors. "I am helping."

"You've stripped that thing three times."

"Rule number one - always keep your weapons in good condition." The older fox spun the pistol like a gunslinger and slid it into its holster. Before climbing to his feet and stomping over to Tails' position.

"This is bullshit!" The future doppelganger moaned, leaning over Tails and frowning at the screen. Tails shifted irritably as a pair of military tags brushed his ear. "We should be out there looking! Not hanging around here like a set of wet farts!"

Tails sighed and continued his work. 

"I'm sure people would ask questions..." The younger fox replied, "if they saw two of me suddenly hanging around..."

Nuts shrugged. "Just tell em I'm a cousin or something. Its more or less accurate."

"And what about your big friend? He sticks out like a sore thumb..."

Nuts yawned. "Who said anything about bringing Green along?" He looked longingly at the satellite imagery on the screens. "Besides... It'd be good to... See the old place again..."

Tails looked to his alternate self and felt a stab of sorrow. Nuts was just a year older than him, but it seemed like he had seen... too much. Tails wasn't stupid. He knew the older fox was hiding something.

"We'll... figure something out..." The younger twin replied, scraping his chair back and stretching.

Nuts stepped back as the other fox stood. It was still odd even after two days, that this chipper young kid used to be him.

"If you go out..." The young inventor said, raising a finger, "you don't go wearing that..." He gestured to Nuts' military fatigues, that were of entirely alien design, " and you especially dont take _that_." He pointed to the pistol slung at his counterpart's hip.

Nuts shot him a look of disapproval. "What, you want me to cut my dick off too? Break my other arm?"

Tails flinched at the older fox's crude language.

"You can't just wander around with guns, Nuts... It isn't considered normal behaviour for thirteen year old Mobians..."

" _nyah nyah nyah..._ " Nuts raised his gauntleted hand and flapped the fingers like a mouth, mocking the other fox's voice. "Relax dude, I'll behave myself..."

Tails pinched the bridge of his nose, as a blue hedgehog entered the room.

Sonic raised an eyebrow. "Tails?"

Two pairs of ears perked, and two sets of blue eyes looked to the hedgehog expectantly.

The two brothers looked to the future boy, who shrugged his shoulders.

"Sorry..." Muttered Nuts, "force of habit..."

Sonic grimaced. "Any luck this end?"

Tails shook his head. "Nothing," the fox replied. "Robotnik seems to be elusive as ever.'

"And I'm tired of hanging around here..." Nuts added, "so me and the squirt were thinking of taking a trip out..."

Tails' fur bristled and sonic held back a chuckle.

"We said nothing of the kind!" Tails replied indignantly. "and who the heck are you calling _squirt?_ you're one year older than me! "

"One year older and one inch taller, thank you very much!"

Sonic watched with amusement as the 'twins' bickered, before coughing to get their attention.

"so Nuts..." The hedgehog said, arms folded , "I don't suppose you know where your big friend is?"

Nuts shrugged. "Not a clue."

Tails groaned with frustration. "You don't know?"

"Green kinda does his own thing."

"You think it's a good idea to let a six-foot armoured space marine just wander around wherever? "

"What, do _you_ wanna stop him?"

Tails buried his face in his hands as Sonic chuckled, his more reckless twin eyeing him with amusement. 

"So," said Sonic, grinning at his other brother, "You feel like a little sightseeing?"

................................................

Tails had finally relented at Nuts' insistence on heading out. The fox from the future had insisted on the activity, something to do while Tails' systems scanned for Robotnik.

They just had to get Nuts looking like an actual Mobian again.

Sonic entered the workshop and absently chattered to his brother.

"Okay Tails..." He said, the orange fox turning with perked ears, "I'll keep our big friend busy back here, you and Nuts be careful out there, right?"

The fox, clad in his usual tool bandolier, sneakers and goggles, looked the Hedgehog over with amusement.

Sonic eyed his brother curiously, noting the close cut fur, the lined face... and the metallic sheen of a mechanical arm brace.

The fox grinned mischievously.

Sonic's face slowly slit into a smile. "... Nuts?"

The fox laughed, setting his gauntleted hand on a hip and adjusted his goggles. 

"almost had you there, hedgehog!"

Sonic looked the Mobian over. He really was a dead ringer for the younger fox.

Well duh, of course he was. He technically _was_ Tails.

"Okay, remember..." The hedgehog's attention switched to another orange fox as Tails, wearing an almost identical outfit to his twin, entered the workshop, "if we bump into anyone you... Oh, hi Sonic."

Sonic grinned as he looked between the two foxes. But for slight differences, they were identical.

"well, this sure is interesting!" The hedgehog chuckled, causing Tails to fidget with embarrassment, while Nuts wrapped one arm around his twin's shoulders .

"So," the older fox grinned, "what do you think?"

"I think..." sonic laughed, "you two are really going to screw with people's heads!"

Nuts chuckled. "Can you imagine the kind of shit we could get up to?"

Tails groaned. "Please behave yourself..."

Nuts raised his hands defensively. "I will be a Very Good Boy. Promise!"

"Just remember... " tails continued, locking eyes with his double. "Were going for exercise only. Dont approach anyone don't talk to anyone, don't even breathe in the direction of another person without my say so! And for Chaos' sake, don't go wandering off! We need to preserve the timeline as best we can, outside of stopping the invasion! Got it?."

"Yeah yeah yeah..." Nuts waved away Tails' concern. "Jeez, I forgot how much of a worrier I used to be.. "

All three Mobians' ears perked as heavy footfalls sounded, and the Slayer entered the workshop. The human paused, mild confusion settling over his face as he took in the sight of two almost identical twin-tailed foxes.

.............................................

"Be careful out there!" Sonic called, stood beside the Doom guy as they watched the foxes depart.

Nuts was hopping with excitement, relishing the opportunity to explore his restored world. Beside him, Tails flashed a thumbs up back to their hedgehog brother.

 _Their_ brother. Was it weird that he was increasingly considering his past self as a sibling?

Hell yeah, it was weird. But it was fun.

The two foxes headed down the beach, the younger taking point. Spray from the sea drizzled Nuts' rapidly thickening fur. It was weird being largely naked again - he'd become accustomed to doing things the human way.

He also felt naked for another reason... This was the first time in months he was unarmed. Tails had forbidden his future double from carrying his usual energy pistol. His hand grasped at the empty space where the weapon should be. At least he had his combat knife.

Doing his best to put his missing pistol out of his mind, Nuts grinned as he hopped up onto a rock and looked out over the expanse of the ocean. He set both hands on hips and raised his nose, taking a whiff of the crisp sea air. After months of living in the enclosed space of the Fortress of Doom, this was the life.

"enjoying yourself?"

Nuts jerked at the less-worn sound of his own voice, and turned to find his younger double looking up at him.

Nuts hopped from the rock, reclaimed red and white sneakers sinking into the sand.

"Been living on a spaceship for the last few months... " the older fox replied, stretching his arm, "I'm overdue for some decent air!"

Tails cocked his head. "where is your ship right now?"

Nuts shrugged. "Behind the moon, outside detection range." He considered for a moment, before turning to the other fox with a smirk. "wish you could see it! You'd love it! "

Tails cocked his head. "You think? "

Nuts wore an incredulous grin and tapped his head. "Uh... I kinda _know? "_

Tails ears drooped and he fiddled awkwardly with his hands. "Oh yeah... I keep forgetting that you... that you're..."

"Uh huh, I get it..." Nuts looked away, staring at his sneakers. The red and white footwear felt light and flimsy on his feet. He wished he had his usual thick boots.

 _That you're me..._ the younger fox's unfinished explanation ran through his head.

_Not quite, dude. Not any more._

Nuts raised his nose to the air and sniffed, taking note of the beautiful sunny day and lack of wind.

"Good flying weather..." The future fox's ears perked as an idea entered his head, and he turned to shoot his alternate self a sly grin.

Tails wore a concerned expression as his older double eyed him hungrily, like he was planning something.

"Uh..." The younger fox hummed, "what... are you looking at me like that for?"

Nuts grinned and uttered single word.

"Race."

Tails' eyes widened and he jabbed a finger at the other fox.

"No! I came along to keep an eye on you and make sure you don't do anything reckless! If anyone sees you-"

"Ah, don't be such a pisspants..." Nuts hopped into the air, twin tails spinning madly. "Try and keep up!"

Tails watched in exasperation as his more reckless self, reminding him more of Sonic right now, flashed away in a blaze of orange over the forests toward the centre of the island.

He shook his head and lowered his flight goggles.

"why the hell do I always have to be the responsible one?"

With that, Miles Prower rocketed off into the sky in hot pursuit of the alternate version of himself.

........................................

The doomed Marine grunted as he took note of the fleshy, moustached face glaring at him from the screen. So humans existed on this planet too. Huh.

At least a few, from what he could tell. 

This couldn't just be a different point in time. This had to be some kind of parallel dimension. Maybe an alternate version of Earth? No, the stars werent right for that...

Whatever. He didn't care. The marine had been hurled across time and space and the multiverse in his hopeless quest to end the tyranny of Doom. All that mattered was finishing this fight, leaving... and moving on to the next. He wondered where his destiny would lead him. He wondered if he would ever see home again.

He wondered how far he could fit his boot up this 'Robotnik's ass. Mad scientist types unleashing Hell... one of the Marine's pet peeves.

He sighed, straightening up and flicking off the computer console that sat in Nuts... _Tails'_... command centre. He'd read enough.

He looked around as he entered the workshop, pondering his strange predicament. His eyes wandered past a sleek red biplane sat in the middle of the concrete floor, surrounded by tools and equipment and spare parts. Outside, a white beach shone under a clear blue sky.

Weird. He wasn't used to this kind of peace.

He wondered... If his own world could be restored in this way.

Maybe. Whatever happened though, he'd be doing it alone. The kid had his world back now, and a chance to save it... another chance at a normal life. They would stop the invasion, the human would leave, and they'd part ways. Such was life for the Eternal Slayer.

Shame. He'd miss the kid.

The Slayer grunted to himself as he turned, considering checking his weapons loading for the hundredth time, maybe taking a quick patrol around the area - and started as he found himself face to face with his short blue host.

The hedgehog jumped back, ears perked and hands raised defensively.

How the hell did he keep _doing_ that?

"Woah, sorry dude!" The hedgehog cried with a grin "guess I need to remember not to sneak up on YOU like that!" Green eyes lowered and the creature gestured toward the gauntlet wrapped around the grip of Lucifer's Bane. "You're not... planning on using that thing, are you?" a blue eyebrow raised. " not sure I'm ready for round two... "

The Slayer relaxed his grip and wore an unamused expression as he looked down at the Mobian. He didn't like being approached without his knowledge.

"Jeez, why so uptight? You gotta relax, dude! Take a minute to chill! "

The Slayer frowned. 

"The success of our mission is vital for the preservation of life on this world," said Vega at a thought from the Slayer . Sonic shrugged.

"Well, until we find where old Egghead's hiding, there's not much we can do about that..." The hedgehog rubbed the back of his quills. "And with the amount of times we've fought against the old cretin, take it from me - he's hard to find unless wants to be found!"

The Slayer raised an eyebrow at that.

"Please confirm..." Said Vega at the human' a mute inquiry, " _We?_ "

"Sure!" The hedgehog grinned, "me and Tails.... Been fighting him for years!"

"We were unaware that Nuts... _Miles_ had prior combat experience before the invasion... "

"What, Tails? Toughest kid I know, despite the fluff! Anyone who can keep with Sonic the Hedgehog is pretty special, anyone'll tell you that! "

Yeah... The Slayer could believe that.

Maybe he had underestimated just how tough his orange charge was.

" Anyway! " the blue hedgehog exclaimed, clapping his hands. "About this whole 'taking things easy' thing..." The Slayer frowned as the Mobian grinned up at him . "You ever eaten chilli dog?"

The Slayer raised an eyebrow, before shaking his head.

......................................

Nuts couldn't help but grin as he ducked into the brush, staying low and using the bushes to cover his bright orange form, as he eyed another orange speck busy patrolling the sky. Tails was looking for him, probably worried he was going to get into mischief. 

Heh. He'd forgotten how much of a square he used to be.

How could he resist but have a little fun, back on his own restored world?

Nuts waited until the orange speck darted away, heading to scan another part of the forest, before he hopped from his cover. He brushed twigs out of his rapidly thickening fur, and rotated a twinge out of his aching corrupted arm.

Tails would be pissed... but that's what little brothers were for, right? Tormenting.

Nuts didn't rightly know. Had never had a little brother. Well, until now. Even if he and Tails were technically the same person from different points in time... It was less of a mental headache to just consider the younger fox a belated twin.

Nuts hummed along to a Metal tune he had running around his head. Well, less hummed and more growled along to the riff in the back of his throat, fingers drumming along to the rhythm.

_dun dun dun dun dunun, dun dun dun duuunnn..._

He grinned as he entered a small clearing filled with yellow flowers. Maybe it was something to do with the air here on Möbius, after so long breathing the artificial oxygen on board the Fortress. He couldn't remember being this damned _happy_.

Nuts set himself down in the grass beside a tree and leaned against the bark, legs crossed and hands behind his head, unwittingly adopting a similar posture to his older brother Sonic. He lazily watched the surrounding trees rustle in the light breeze. Beams of sunlight penetrated the canopy, spores and insects drifting through the light.

Bliss. Like he hadn't experienced in too long.

Nuts' eyes drooped as he slowly began to noddle off. His limbs became jelly. Dreamland beckoned. 

And he started with terror as a soft, familiar voice addressed him from nearby.

"Tails?"

..........................

His eyes snapped open, scanning furiously for threats, as he shoved himself back against the tree. His hand grasped desperately for a pistol that wasn't there, and he locked eyes with the source of the voice.

Pink fur. Green eyes. Bobbed quills. The ghost of the girl he had-

"Tails?" Amy Rose, the pink hedgehog companion of Sonic and Tails, looked down at him uncertainly, from within a beam of sunlight, feet obscured by yellow flowers.

Nuts couldn't speak. Couldn't breathe. Couldn't move.

Could only tremble in terror at the ghost, hand wrapped around the hilt of his combat knife. His eyes bulged.

Amy tilted her head in question, clutching a bunch of flowers, eyes big and questioning beneath a large sun hat. The same she had worn the day...

"What are you doing, Tails?" She said, one eyebrow raised, "just sitting there?"

Nuts' heart raced and his chest tightened, and he fought to make words.

"A... my..."

She dropped her questioning expression, face relaxing into a warm smile.

" yes Miles... its me..."

Was she real?

"Amy..." The fox croaked, tears running down his cheeks, "I... I'm sorry..."

Amy smiled with amusement. "Whatever for, Miles?"

Nuts swallowed, his panic relaxing, grief now settling over him like a blanket.

"I... couldn't save you..." He whispered, now unsteadily crawling to his feet, "couldn't... Save anybody... all my fault..."

Amy's smile fell a little as she gazed sadly at the damaged fox, as he gawped at her with longing. 

"But now you have another chance..." The ghost replied, remaining still but somehow out of reach as the fox stumbled toward her. "To put things right... the person you are now, the soldier you have become..." She smiled again, the expression comforting and warm. "You have the strength to do what you have to..."

Nuts' shoulders slumped, ears drooped, as he realised he wouldn't reach her. The girl that wasn't for him. 

" I... Don't know if I can, Ames... " he replied in dismay, looking sadly at the ghost who had been taken, understanding he was seeing things again. "I just... don't have it in me..."

She smiled as she began to melt back into the forest, retreating further from his reach.

"You can..." She replied, "and you will... and I'll always be there for you in your darkest moments..."

Big, wet blue eyes met shining green, as she dissolved further from his conscious. 

"How do you think..." The fox croaked, "things could have turned out? If... our world wasn't lost?"

"Save this world..." The hedgehog whispered, "and maybe we'll find out..."

Nuts clenched his fists and set his jaw, hatred filling his veins for the monsters he yearned to destroy.

"Okay..." He breathed, face settling back into his usual determined scowl, "I will... for you, Amy..."

A warm smile was his final reply.

"Goodbye, Tails..." She sighed, "I'll be seeing you..."

Nuts stopped himself from reaching out as his guardian angel melted away, and he found himself once again alone in a clearing filled with yellow flowers.

"Goodbye, Ames..."

.........................

Tails angrily hovered above the forest, scanning desperately for his missing twin. 

"Dammit, Nuts..." He grumbled, "does the concept of 'not screwing around with the timeline' even mean anything to you?"

Well, perhaps not. He was here to drastically change the future after all. But Tails didn't like him wandering off willy nilly.

He lowered to a hover above the trees, a handheld device in his hands, scanning for life signs. In particular his own.

"I swear, I never knew I could be so irresponsible..." The fox muttered, "between you and Sonic, I'm gonna have a stroke before I'm-"

_Bleep. Bleep. Bleep._

There. His device registered the life signs he was looking for, a kilometre away beneath the canopy. Tails hummed with relief as he began to descend, readying himself to chew out his older double. Yeah, Nuts had issues, but he had once been Tails himself. He should know better than to be so reckless, especially when the stakes were so high! Just like Sonic...

Tails frowned as his device appeared to pick up an extremely light life signature, before it faded and was gone. He shrugged internally. Probably a glitch. He'd have to take a look at the device when he returned to his workshop.

..............................

Tails fluttered to a landing, red and white sneakers settling lightly into the flowers before a familiar orange figure leaned against a nearby tree. He slotted his device back into its assigned pouch and approached his double.

" What the heck are you doing, dude?" The younger fox grumbled, treading carefully through the flowers, "I told you not to go wandering off..."

He trailed off as he approached the other fox, suddenly taking note that Nuts' slumped posture. His twin sat limply, fiddling with the tags that bore his altered name, staring gloomily through his own feet.

He looked heartbroken.

"Hey..." Said Tails, suddenly concerned, "are you... okay?"

Big, wet eyes flicked up to meet his, and Tails flinched at the haunted look in his twin's face.

"Amy..." The older fox croaked, "I... saw Amy..."

Tails felt a pang of sudden panic, cursing himself for letting his future twin out of his sight.

"You did what?" He cried, exasperated, "you didn't talk to her did you?"

Nuts shook his head. "Not your Amy..." He replied, despair in his voice, "mine..."

Tails frowned, confused. "What... do you mean?"

Nuts shook his head and looked back to his tags. Tails couldn't help but notice tears staining his muzzle.

"It... doesn't matter..."

Tails allowed his irritation to slide and set his hands on his hips. " I don't know, " he replied, curious at the older fox's disposition. "Seems like it matters quite a bit..."

Nuts looked back up at him, condescension in his eyes.

"You... wouldn't understand..." He replied, "and you don't need to know..."

Tails let his arms slump as he observed the grieving form of his alternate self. He hadn't seen Nuts this... dismayed, before. Something was seriously wrong. Something, in particular, about Amy.

The younger fox settled himself down beside his twin, and relaxed into a cross-legged position.

"I think maybe I should..." He replied, looking curiously over his twins' haunted features, "it might... help me understand?"

Slowly, the other fox turned to fix his younger self with a dazed glare, consideration running through his mind.

Long moments of silence passed before he spoke.

"It's not just an alien invasion..." He finally croaked, "Its Hell. Its literally Hell, Tails... and it consumes everything." he glared pointedly at the younger fox, _"Every. Thing."_

Tails went cold, his fur bristled, as the ice-blue eyes locked with his unwaveringly.

" And they don't just kill..." Nuts continued, his voice hoarse, "They... _take_ people... take their bodies..." The older fox's eyes became unfocused, his face gaunt as he began to lose himself in the memory.

"They... _took_ Amy..." He continued, sending a chill up Tails' spine, "changed her..." His eyes locked back with Tails', who couldn't help but notice Nuts' hands begin to shake.

"She _begged_ me to kill her..." Nuts went on, voice barely a whisper, "So... so I did... I shot her until she was in _bits..._ "

Tails' mouth was now hanging open as he felt the horror bleed from his twin.

"The... pieces still _moved..._ " A dreadful tension now enveloped the pair like a great weight, pressing down like an anvil.

Nuts' eyes again refocused, glaring into Tails' like lasers. 

"Her soul..." The fox whimpered, "I _saw_ her soul leave her body, Tails... and it was _still. Screaming._ "

Tails slumped, absolutely lifeless, the horrifying images running through his brain.

He swallowed a lump in his throat, a burning question he needed to ask.

"How many survived..." He whispered, dreading the answer, "besides you?"

Nuts said nothing, simply glaring into Tails' eyes. 

His silence said everything Tails needed to know.

"I... can't imagine how bad it was.. " he said, "what you went through..."

Nuts leaned his head against the tree they shared and closed his eyes. "Hopefully you'll never find out..." He sighed, "still needs to be one sweet and innocent Tails, after all..."

"If it's any consolation..." Tails replied, "I think you're pretty badass?"

Nuts laughed humourlessly.

"Me? Badass? dumbass maybe... crazy-ass lunatic, absolutely... " the time-travelling fox who had survived Hell looked glumly at his tags. "Maybe when this is all over I'll have myself commited... spend the rest of my life in a room with rubber walls..."

Tails frowned. "What are you going to do when this is over?" He said, considering the possibility of there being two Tails in permanent residence on Mobius. 

Nuts shrugged. "Assuming I don't fade out of existence, Marty McFly style..." He grinned at the reference that Tails had no way of understanding , "I dunno..." His grin faded as he looked sadly around at the surrounding forest , so beautiful and peaceful in its uncorrupted state. "I don't think I belong here any more though... I'm... too fucked up. I might be able to fix this world... but I don't think I can ever fix myself."

Tails felt sorrow for his damaged future twin. "will you ever come back?"

Nuts frowned, considering. "Someday..." He replied uncertainly , "maybe..."

Tails rested a comforting hand on the cold green pauldron of a mechanical arm. "I think I'd like that..." He said, " Sonic too... "

Nuts chuckled, reaching over and scratching his twin's identical hand with his own.

"You know what? Me too."

There was a moment of silence, before both foxes jerked with surprise at Tails' bleeping wrist communicator. Tails scrambled to accept the call, noting that once again Nuts had his hand wrapped around his combat knife.

"Sonic?" The younger fox replied, recognising the caller ID as he climbed to his feet, "You gave me a heart attack! What's up?"

_"Got some good news, little buddies!"_ their older brother's chipper tone crackled cheerfully through the communicator, Nuts standing to join his younger twin as Tails held the device between them at chest level. _"It might have taken little while, but with a little help from Nuts' robo-mom..."_

 _"I do not appreciate this moniker,"_ the artificial voice of Vega cut in, indignantly.

 _"Yeah yeah, sorry dude..."_ Sonic replied happily, _"But we finally did it. We found Robotnik! And he's hiding something real interesting to our big green friend here..."_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, so I'm not a hundred percent happy with this chapter... but I've been trying to get it finished to progress the story.
> 
> I do love writing brotherly interactions between Tails and Nuts, though!


	9. Beginning of the End

The Fortress of Doom had been abandoned for several days.

The ancient Battle Station of the Night Sentinels, Argentia's mightiest warriors, first and last line of resistance against the forces of Hell, hung in orbit around the primary moon of Mobius, hiding behind the natural satellite's dark side. Its halls were silent and empty, life support at a minimum so as to conserve power, at present a ghost ship.

Until, on the empty bridge, the Transportation Portal began to hiss and spark with activity. Power ran through the systems, and a whirling maelstrom of crackling blue and white lightning blossomed into existence before the station's main viewscreen, a tear in space creating a passage of energy. 

From this gate stepped four figures. One tall and armoured, one shorter and blue, and two near identical orange creatures.

Sonic and Tails took a look around their new surroundings, the Fortress of Doom's bridge filled with advanced computer stations, iron statues of Sentinels and Gargoyles, flickering blue artificial torches, a huge holographic representation of the Planet Mobius hanging in the space above their heads. Sonic let out a long whistle while Tails' eyes simply bulged with fascination.

"Whoo…" the blue hedgehog said, craning his neck to see up into the rafters, "Eggman's had plenty of ships, but this is _something else!_ "

"This is... utterly fascinating!" Tails replied, the Warp Portal snapping closed behind the party. The little fox began sniffing at computer stations, eager to investigate the ancient technology, until a gauntleted hand clapped onto his shoulder. He turned to find Nuts' particular grimace, the alternate version of himself glaring into his eyes.

"Please don't touch anything..." the older twin said, giving Tails a brief squeeze with the gauntlet to show he meant business.

"O... okay, sorry!" the younger replied, backing sheepishly away from the computers.

"So, when do we get to the part where we kick Egghead's butt?" Sonic said, lopsided grin plastered over his face as he turned to the DoomSlayer. The human grinned back and signed in the language Sonic had taught him, _'Soon. Things to do first.'_

"Okay, whatever you say, Guy of Doom!" The hedgehog replied cheerily, as the Slayer stomped over the deck toward his protégé.

"Nuts..." Vega's artificial voice reverberated from the ship's communications systems, the Synthetic Intelligence now back in control of the Fortress, "The Slayer requires your attention in the armoury. Sonic, Tails, you will wait here and await their return."

Sonic gave a thumbs up in the vague direction of the ceiling. "Sure thing, robo-dude!!"

"What are we doing?" Nuts enquired as he inspected a weapons rack, ears flopping as he tilted his head curiously, "We have what we need right here, we can assault right now!"

The Slayer shook his head and gestured that the fox follow, stomping over the rocksteel deck in his fat boots. Nuts sighed in frustration, eager to get on with the mission, and boosted forward with his twin tails to keep up with his big friend.

Sonic and Tails, left alone on the ancient bridge, began to explore their new environment. 

"Oh hey! Look at this!" Sonic said, gesturing to some kind of square picture on the wall, decorated with satanic symbolism and images of hell. "I wonder what this does?"

"Sonic, they said not to touch anyt-"

Too late. The hedgehog hopped up and pressed the 'painting'... only to have extremely loud and growling guitars blast out from the bridge's sound systems, the Thrash Metal album in question activated at a touch.

"Shut it off!!" Tails screeched, covering his ears, "SHUT IT OFF!!!!"

...............................................................................

Nuts stood bare in the Fortress Armoury, as the Slayer began assembling armour around his smaller form. First came the body suit, black and skin-tight, fitting easily over his close-shaven fur. Then the Slayer began to fit armoured panels to the fox, shin and leg guards, gauntlets and pauldrons, the front and rear sections of the armoured torso. Finally, Nuts stepped into his armoured boots, fixing them with thick latches... and the Slayer nodded approvingly at his battle-ready apprentice.

The Slayer's throat rumbled, phlem and mucus gurgling as he forced his long-unused vocal chords to function once again.

"R.. ready..." the Slayer just managed to speak, and Nuts nodded in understanding.

"Thank you..." the Mobian replied, as the Slayer turned and headed toward another station. The fox hadn't expected this. But the Slayer, knowing of his many prior battle with Robotnik's forces, had had Vega manufacture a downsized suit of armour from the ship's matter replicators, fitted especially for Nuts' unique capabilities, as well as customized weapons for the kid. Nuts could handle himself, the Slayer knew, and his experience in fighting this 'Eggman' would be a good first battle as a Night Sentinel.

"Thank you.." The fox said again, the Slayer returning with something in his hands, "For letting me save my world..."

The Slayer grunted, and held out his burden. Nuts looked to find a downsized helmet, green with a down-swept visor, a complete imitation of the Praetor Suit's... with triangular rubberized compartments for his ears.

Nuts took the helmet with awe, and felt a surge of pride as he regarded his own reflection in the mirrored visor. He grinned up at the Slayer, who reached down and clapped him on the shoulder.

The human hefted his own helmet from a workbench, and gestured to his apprentice. _Let's go._

..................................................................…

"Y'know..." Sonic said, lightly rocking his head as he leaned back against a computer terminal, "I could get used to this! It's fast!"

Tails, itching to investigate the ancient technology surrounding him, did his best to ignore the rapid pounding of the music Sonic had unwittingly forced upon him. "Could you turn it down at least?" The fox whined, "It's giving me a migraine..."

"Ooh! Look at these!!" Sonic flashed across the room, now inspecting a barrel full of old swords. He pulled one out and began swinging it happily.

"Hey!" cried Tails, "Nuts said to not touch anything!!"

"Why do you think these Sentinel guys used swords?" Sonic said, cheerfully ignoring his friend's concern, "Weren't they supposed to be, like, super advanced?"

"I dunno…" Tails said resignedly, "Maybe they're magical... space-swords or something."

"Ha! Space-swords?! That's never work, little buddy..."

The two brothers were cut off in their chattering as the main doors to the bridge hissed open, Sonic hurriedly returning his sword where it belonged with a clang. Two armoured figures stood in the door, one tall and scarred... the other short and twin-tailed.

"Well!" Sonic said, offering a mock salute, "Attention on deck!!"

Nuts, clad in his cut down Praetor-style armour and helmet tucked under one arm, offered his brother a lopsided smirk. "What do you think? Should I do a twirl?"

"Nah, dude! You're rocking it!" Sonic gave a cautious look at the rifle slung over the fox's back, and the pistol in his holster. "Not sure about the firepower, though..."

"Dude, we're fighting robots, and potentially flesh-eating demons. We're not killing any _people_ , okay?"

"Sure..." Sonic said, crossing his arms, "But what about Eggman?"

Nuts grimaced, wearing a death stare. "The fat sack of _shit_ will get his."

"Remember, buddy..." Sonic replied, pointing sternly at his younger alternate-timeline brother, "That's not how we do things down there... we go down, we smash a bunch of bots, we capture Eggman, and we all go home. Deal?"

Nuts nodded slowly. "Deal."

"Vega?" Sonic said, looking up to the Slayer's helmeted visage, "Did Doomguy get that?"

"Affirmative," the SI replied, followed by a thumbs-up from his human companion.

"Okay! Then I think it's time we get on-mission! Or whatever you soldier guys say!"

" _Sentinel..._ " Nuts replied, fixing his helmet with a hiss, the visor rippling into a transclucent blue-green, "Not soldier."

Sonic watched with some disapproval as Nuts unslung a chunky plasma rifle, customized for his shorter frame, and hefted the weapon. Beside him, the Slayer did the same with his Super Shotgun, checking the Meat Hook attachment with a thick gauntlet.

"I'll support from long-range..." Nuts said, patting his weapon, "Green will smash everything to _shit,_ and Sonic? You just do your thing."

Sonic saluted "Yes sir, Captain Crazy!"

"Wait!" the trio looked to find Tails, fists clenched, pouting as he realised his exclusion from the briefing. "I'm coming too!"

 _"No way, little buddy!"_ Both Sonic and Nuts said at once, briefly glancing to one another before approaching their younger brother. "This isn't just another adventure, bud!" Sonic said, taking over the conversation, "We might be fighting... something _more_ than just a few Badniks. Something _evil._ And I... don't want you to be involved if the..." He turned briefly to Nuts, considering, " _Shit_ hits the fan. You get me?"

"It's my world too!" Tails pouted, glaring between his older siblings, "And I've been fighting Badniks almost as long as you, Sonic! And _you..._ " the smaller fox pointed to the taller, armoured vulpine, "You _know_ I can handle myself in a fight!"

Sonic turned and looked to Nuts, who shrugged.

"It's up to you, dude..." Nuts said to Sonic.

Sonic bit his lip, before turning back to his younger brother. "Okay, dude. But if _anything_ goes wrong down there... you bug out ASAP. Got it?"

Tails nodded eagerly, Sonic clapping him on the shoulder and backing up as Nuts approached. The Sentinel apprentice, taller now in his armour, undid his pistol holster and handed it to the younger fox. "I know Sonic doesn't like it..." He said, face barely visible through the milky blue visor, "But I know you and me like a little bit of technology at hand." Tails glanced down at the energy pistol, before nodding at Nuts and securing the belt around his own waist. "Just point and pull the trigger!" Nuts continued, hefting his rifle, "And stay close to me!"

Tails wore a grimace, filled with determination, as he joined his three companions on the assault ramp before the transporter.

"Coordinates set..." Vega announced, the swirling mass of the warp portal forming before them, roiling like an electrical sea, "We will be dropping directly into the heart of Doctor Robotnik's hidden North-Pole base. The portal is fully activated, and ready to go when you are."

"Okay, guys!" Sonic said, dropping into a running start and wearing a determined grin, "Let's save the world!"

"Let's rock n' roll!" Agreed Nuts.

"We can do it if we all work together!" cried Tails. 

"Unf," said Doomguy.

And then, as one, the four combatants broke into a run and launched themselves through the warp portal, into the attack.

.............................................................................

Deep in the recesses of his hidden lair, buried beneath the thick ice of Mobius' North Pole, the great Doctor Ivo Robotnik was wrenched from his sleep by the wail of his base's security alarms.

_"RED ALERT. RED ALERT. SECURITY BREACH IN SECTION C. REPEAT, SECURITY BREACH IN SECTION C."_

"What in the BLAZES?!?" The doctor tore himself out of bed and stormed over to his tactical console, angrily adjusting his spectacles as he swiped through the security feeds to Section C. He growled to himself as he found a familiar blue blur, pinballing between his defensive Badniks, the lumbering robots unable to maintain a lock on their elusive target.

"BLAST IT!!! THAT INFERNAL HEDGEHOG!!!!" The doctor snarled, pounding a fist onto his control panel, "How the HELL has he managed to penetrate so deep into my defences?!?"

The Doctor was about to turn away, before noting that the hedgehog was not alone. One of his companions was small and orange - the upstart canine Miles Prower, no doubt - but the other two were armoured, one short and mobian in appearance... the other tall, heavily armed, and blasting swathes of his Badniks apart as if they weren't there while his smaller comrades cleared space around him.

The Doctor grimaced. No wonder the hedgehog had gotten so deep, considering the firepower his mysterious friend was packing. No matter. He would handle this himself.

"Computer!!" He commanded, "Ready the Egg-Robo Ultra! I'll head down there and take care of these intruders myself!"

"YES, DOCTOR. EGG-ROBO ULTRA COMING ONLINE."

With a final growl at his tactical display, the Doctor turned to ready himself for battle. He had to protect his... _their_ plans, after all.

.................................................................

As soon as their boots hit the ground, the team were straight into the fight. Defensive Badniks, caught off guard by the sudden attack, had no chance to respond as the Slayer lunged forward, smashing the vaguely humanoid egg-shaped robots to scrap. Sonic, far faster even than the Slayer, burst into sonic speed and popped targets like they didn't exist. While the two main players got busy, Nuts hefted his weapon and grasped Tails' shoulder.

"Come on! Stick with me!!"

The armoured fox raised his rifle and began plopping accurate streams of energy into the targets surrounding Sonic and the Slayer, offering support while they took on the main bulk of the defensive force. Tails, clutching his unfamiliar energy pistol, tagged along, ready to put his own shots into the fight. Truth be told, it had been a while since he'd joined Sonic in a battle like this... he was rusty, but the very existence of the other fox before him meant he had what it took to be a true fighter. Like Sonic.

Nuts boosted forward with his tails, closely followed by Miles himself, boots slamming into the steel deck beside the Slayer as a large, rotary barrel weapon fizzled into existence in the human's hands with a flash of red, and began chugging high-calibre rounds into the horde of Badniks that now stomped toward them. Nuts stood beside his mentor, the two armoured fighters mowing down bots like wheat, Tails offering the odd energy blast while Sonic watched on at the display of destruction. Finally, the weapons fell silent, the wide hall ahead now filled with a sea of scrap metal.

Sonic shrugged and offerend a grin as the Slayer looked down at him. "Eh. I coulda handled it without guns. jus' sayin'…"

The area ahead is clear," Vega informed the group, "We should move closer to the main laboratory..."

"Then let's get moving! Why is this taking so long?!" Sonic jeered, jogging off ahead of the group. Nuts patted his mentor's armguard, bringing the Slayer's attention to him. 

"Yeah, Green? Sonic can be a little competitive... if you haven't noticed!"

The Slayer grunted before boosting ahead with his armour thrusters, followed closely by the two foxes.

They entered a large arena, swarming with Badniks... all of which surrounded a very large, gleaming red battle mech, atop which sat the rotund form of Robotnik himself behind the controls.

 _"Well well well!! Sonic and Tails!!"_ the Doctor's voice boomed from the huge mech's speakers, the machine's limbs moving in time with his own. _"I don't know how you and your STRANGE new friends came this far into my secret lair, but I promise you you will go NO FURTHER!!!"_

"Give it up, Eggman!!" Sonic cried, raising a fist to the maniacal tyrant, "We've beaten you before, and that's _without_ an angry couple of Space Marines on our side!!"

_"I don't care HOW many 'Space Marines' you have with you, Sonic!! I will crush you all beneath the iron boot of the Eggman Empire!!!"_

"Eat a dick, Robotnik!!" Nuts spoke up, joining Sonic in his defiance, "You have no _fucking_ idea what you're playing with here!!! Just give up before we kick your ass!"

 _"Oh-ho! I think not, my foul-mouthed little friend!!"_ The doctor leered behind his controls, continuing his monologue. _"With the assistance of my new allies, my glorious regime will not only conquer this chaos-forsaken world, but will reach out into the UNIVERSE!!! And..."_

Doomguy grunted something and gestured to the ranting dictator, and Nuts racked his weapon in understanding. 

"Green's right. Why are we listening to this guy?"

The team exchanged knowing looks, before cutting Robotnik's villainous monologue short and leaping into action.

................................................…

"And when I have conquered every one of you miserable creatures, you know what else I'll do?!? I'll- HEY!!!"

Robotnik snarled as something explosive slammed into the hull of his battle mech, and he ceased his malevolent ranting to find the team of intruders now smashing his forces to pieces. The tall, green figure now hefted some kind of elongated tube-like weapon, spewing fast-moving rockets in his direction.

"GRAARGH!!!! YOU FOOLISH LITTLE MAN!!!!!" The Doctor activated the Egg-Robo Ultra's defences, and readied himself to crush the other human like an insect. "TASTE MY WRATH!!!!"

...........................................................

For once in his life, the Slayer didn't have to worry about tackling the hordes of supporting enemies alone. Nuts and his 'twin' Tails stayed back, buzzing around using their flight capabilities and putting in shots from range, while Sonic the hedgehog zoomed around smashing any bots that tried to impede the Slayer as he fired rocket after rocket into the giant mech's hull. The thing was tough, his rockets just bouncing from the armour plate. He looked to the very top of the machine, where the 'head' sat, finding the grotesquely fat moustachioed Doctor he knew as 'Robotnik' pounding at the controls.

He switched to his BFG 9000, his ultimate weapon that would surely be capable of annihilating the machine.... befiore he remembered his promise. He wouldn't kill this man. Not yet, anyway.

The Slayer was suddenly aware of bots surrounding him, for once too slow as an energy bolt clipped his armour. He growled in rage and readied his Super Shotgun... but before he could fire back, a blue bolt smashed into the attacking bots, pinballing between them and popping them into junk in a matter of seconds. Sonic the hedgehog smacked down perfectly on his feet as the last bot fell, and shrugged nonchalantly.

"See? Told ya I don't need guns!"

"We could have handled it..." Vega responded for the human, "Just saying."

 _"Guys, I hate to break up the date, but..."_

_"REMEMBER EGGMAN?!?"_

As Nuts' and Tails' voices crackled over their communications systems, Sonic and Doomguy returned their attention to the giant mech... that now began spooling up giant energy cannons in its massive hands.

Sonic grinned. "Boss fight?"

The Slayer nodded, and the two heroes boosted forward to finish the Doctor and his machine.

Sonic boosted around the walls of the arena, putting powerful spin attacks into weak points in the mech's armour, while the Slayer blasted away with his arsenal of weapons. The Doctor roared through his loudspeakers, unable to maintain a lock on both assailants at once, his energy weapons spewing plasma everywhere. 

Sonic slammed into one of the Egg-Robo's knees, causing it to falter and stumble to the ground. The Slayer hopped onto a lowered arm, and clambered his way up the war machine's armoured bulk, making his way to the control pod up top.

Sonic, seeing what his comrade was planning, hit the ground at a sprint and boosted into super speed, riding around the walls of the huge chamber and launching himself from a platform... right at the transparent casing of the Doctor's cockpit. The transparent armour shattered, leaving the Doctor exposed, and the hedgehog leaped away as the Doctor retrieved a large energy pistol from his belt.

"AARGH!! GET BACK HERE YOU CONTEMPTIBLE LITTLE HEDGE-"

Robotnik didn't get to finish his statement. Instead he choked as a thick, armoured gauntlet lunged forward and grabbed him around the throat, the furious eyes of the Doom Slayer glaring at him from behind his visor.

The Slayer wrenched the doctor from the Egg-Robo and, almost casually, tossed a grenade into the cockpit before lunging from the machine's chassis. The control pod was reduced to shrapnel in the explosion, causing the machine to teeter and totter, before eventually falling backward into a giant mechanical heap, shaking the ground as it was taken out of commision.

…......…...….........…......……......…..

The Slayer, along with his 'passenger', slammed into the deck with a _thump_. Behind him, the Egg-Robo quivered as secondary explosions blasted from its hull, bursting like bubbles of methane from a bloated, decaying corpse.

"AAARGH!!" Robotnik beat ineffectually at the Slayer with his fists, bleating pitifully as the armoured human gripped him by his uniform collar. "LET ME GO!! LET ME G-AAAAAACK!!!!"

The slayer did as he was asked, unceremoniously dumping the overweight scientist to the floor like a sack of potatoes. Around them, the rest of the team assembled, Sonic and Tails joining the second armoured figure as they regarded the Doctor without pity.

"Well, egg-brains!" Sonic jeered, "Guess that's another one for Team Sonic, huh?"

"Yeah! Suck it, egg-face!" cried Tails, uncharacteristically crude for the fox-boy.

"Ugh..." Robotnik groaned, "You INSUFFERABLE PESTS!!! Ruining my plans AGAIN!!!! If it wasn't for your meddling new friends, my Empire would have risen to rule this world supreme!!! I-"

Once again, Robotnik was violently silenced as the shorter armoured being offered him a boot to the ribs, the Doctor's ranting devolving into wheezing as he was winded. The figure stood over him, reaching to their collar, and removed their helmet with a hiss.

The Doctor, his breath slowly returning, went wide eyed and just about managed to whimper as his eyes met angry blue. His eyes flickered between not one, but two identical orange foxes, one of which held a chunky energy rifle in one hand.

"T... Tails?!?"

The armoured fox grinned hungrily, like a wolf with its prey, and Robotnik couldn't help but shiver at the violent intent in the eyes.

"Nuts?" Sonic said carefully, "What are you doing?"

The fox standing over him simply glared down at Robotnik, fury plastered over his face, before raising the barrel of his rifle to point directly at the Doctor's head.

"Nuts!"

"NO!" The Doctor whined, attempting to scramble away, "No, ple-AACKK!!"

The doctor was again halted as the crazy fox deposited a fat boot right into his sternum, causing the misplaced human to curl up and writhe in pain.

"I can't let him live..." Nuts growled, rifle steady in his grip, "I can't let him..."

"Nuts, we had a _deal!_ " Cried Sonic, attempting to talk his brother back to sense. "We don't _kill people!"_

"If he lives," Nuts snarled back, "He'll escape!! He _always_ escapes!!!! And what if he comes back, huh? What if he tried this again!?!?"

Sonic glared into his brother's wild eyes, while Tails hovered uncertainly around the Slayer's knees. The younger fox jerked as the large armoured human stepped forward, moving toward Tails' brothers with intent.

"Then we'll find him again," the hedgehog said calmly, "And beat him. Just like we always do."

Nuts's eyes flickered between Sonic's face right before him... and the small orange fox he used to be, when he wasn't so violent. When he wasn't crazy. When he strived to be just like Sonic, his hero.

Sonic raised an eyebrow. "Remember? Tails?"

Nuts stilled at the familiar nickname he once wore, and his aim faltered.

"Nuts..."

They all looked up to the Doom Slayer, who once again had found it in him to speak, this time the growl far clearer.

"P..." the human tried again, swallowing and moistening his vocal chords "Promise..."

Finally, Nuts allowed his weapon to drop, pointing it toward the floor.

"Okay..." the fox-boy croaked, breathing deep, "Okay... sorry guys, I should have known..."

_"BETTER!!!"_

Suddenly, catching the entire team off-guard in their little moment, the Doctor wrenched himself away from beneath the armoured fox, raising his wrist mounted computer and quickly tapping in commands. Klaxons wailed from all around, and from the bases' speakers a computerized voice boomed.

"WARNING. ARGENT CORE ONLINE. DIMENSIONAL RIFT INITIATED. REPEAT. ARGENT CORE ONLINE. DIMENSIONAL RIFT INITIATED..."

The Doctor yelped as the Slayer lunged forward and wrenched him from his feet by his uniform collar, the barrel of his super shotgun pressed deep into his rotund belly.

"NO!" Cried Sonic, zipping over before the Slayer could release a killing shot, "This is OUR world, we do things OUR way!!"

The doctor chuckled madly, swinging in the Slayer's grip.

"You.. are all... FOOLS!!!" The doctor hissed, glaring from now exposed eyes into the Slayer's visor, "My new friends... from the world beyond.... they will make me immortal... and you will all... PERISH!!!"

"WHAT HAVE YOU DONE?!?" Screamed Nuts, his helmet dropped and forgotten as he screeched at the Doctor. The entire base became illuminated in an otherworldly red light, the snap and hiss of warp portals echoing throughout the facility. "WHAT THE _FUCK_ HAVE YOU DONE?!?"

The Doctor didn't answer, his usual leer suddenly freezing... and morphing into a visage of pure horror. The Doctor screehed at the top of his lungs as his new 'allies' showed him images of exactly what he had unleashed on his world, and the fate that would soon befall him along with all of Mobius. Tears and snot and spittle leaked from the Doctor, as well as other unmentionable bodily fluids, and the Slayer tossed the idiotic man aside like a ragdoll as the hiss of interdimensional creatures rattled all around.

 _"Shit..."_ Nuts swore, checking his weapon and scanning the room for hostiles, "We're too late!!!"

"What's happening?!?" Cried Sonic, adopting a combat posture as the patter and scrape of clawed feet sounded around them.

"Warning," said Vega, before Nuts could explain, "Demonic presence increasing. Contact imminent."

.............................................................

Miles Prower had been fighting the forces of Doctor Robotnik since he was six years old. A very young fox, tagging along behind Sonic, his hero. The hedgehog had taught him how to smash robots, and he'd gotten good at it. Then he'd put his technical skills to use, creating weapons and devices with which the ever growing Team Sonic could use to fight the similarly more powerful and expanding Eggman Empire.

But he'd never been prepared or something like... this.

From rippling, blood red tears in space and time, monstrous creatures burst into his reality like grotesque newborns from the womb. Creatures of pallid flesh, all spikes and snapping jaws and glowing red eyes scampered everywhere, hurling fireballs left and right. Writhing tentacles burst from the floor, reaching into the sky. Fallen egg-bots, those still intact enough to be of use, were claimed by flesh from the other realm and rose again, transformed into shambling horrors of flesh and metal.

The young fox rose his energy pistol and tried to fight, aware that his friends had already moved to pursue their own targets. His heart raced almost a fast as the monsters that scattered around. He fired indiscriminately, too panicked to make accurate shots. His pistol overheated, and he smacked at the thing desperately.

Their was a monstrous screech, and Miles Prower looked up to find a horrific ball of teeth and flesh and spines approaching, a single cyclopean green eye hungrily glistening as the creature sought to bring his doom.

....................................................................

_Move._

He couldn't.

_Fight, you coward._

He tried.

Nuts was vaguely aware that his teammates had jumped straight into the fight, Doomguy ripping and tearing like he did and Sonic popping enemies like fleshy water balloons with his sheer speed. But Nuts had frozen.

He tried to move himself as the monsters flashed into being all around. He couldn't. He could only stand and watch, limp, as the wailing and soiled form of Doctor Robotnik writhed beside him.

_Coward._

They were going to die.

_Traitor._

They were all going to die. Everyone was going to die again, because of him. 

"Miles?" 

Nut's ears perked at the voice, a voice he was sure only he could hear in his head. His eyes scanned his environment, time appearing slowed as though in a dream... the ghostly form of _his_ Amy Rose floating some ways to his right. 

She smiled at him. "Come on, Miles!" The dead hedgehog from another time said, causing the armoured fox's breath to still, "Why won't you fight?" 

_Can't. Too broken._

"Yes you can!" She said soothingly, beginning to fade away, "You have to, Miles! All the death, all the suffering... it all has to be for something!" 

As she faded further from his damaged mind, Miles was able to see who she had been concealing. 

"Make sure the world didn't die for nothing... please, Miles?" 

As she faded away, Miles could plainly see his past self, desperately fiddling with his pistol... about to be swallowed whole by a Cacodemon. 

As he saw his alternate self... no, his _little brother_ about to meet his end, Nuts Blascowickz bared his teeth and screamed a war cry, all the hate and rage and damage and pain caused by the hellish consumption of his world pouring out, his plasma rifle raising and screeching white hot fury. 

The weapon, fully automatic and pouring a stream of stupidly hot white energy, vaporized chunks from the floating horror as Nuts stormed toward it, roaring as its payload of plasma was directed straight into the heart of the monster. 

Nuts gripped the fore of the rifle tight, eyes bulging, aware that his throat was hoarse and his weapon was overheating and the demon was on the floor writhing and half melted away and dead and he didn't care he just kept firing, until the weapon finally gave up and the emergency ventilation systems began to disperse a dangerous amount of heat from the thing. 

The screeching continued as the weapon fell silent, and Nuts realised it wasn't the weapon making the noise - it was him.

"Nuts? Nuts!!"

The armoured fox somehow managed to stop screaming jerking around to find Tails stumbling toward him, wide eyed and shocked at the monster that had almost claimed him.

"Jeez..." Tails croaked, his own weapon held loosely in hand, "Th... thanks!!"

Nuts, wild-eyed and hungry for more blood, turned and swore at the dead Cacodemon. Then he turned back to Tails, punching him on the shoulder.

"Let's go kill more of the _fuckers_!!"

Tails nodded quickly, and followed his brother as Nuts ran off to find more monsters to exact his vengeance upon.

......................................................…

Sonic jumped into another burst of speed, head forward, arms back... barreling through another pack of the spiky brown demons like a wrecking ball. He slowed, hopped from a nearby console, tucked into a ball and reduced another to a fleshy stain on the laboratory floor.

He groaned as he felt more gore cover his spines. These guys were fast and vicious, but were too slow to keep up with him and... _softer_ than the Badniks he was used to fighting. Still, he had a job to do, and right now that was keeping these monsters off of Doomguy's back while the Slayer tore through the bulk of the invading monsters.

There were just so many of them, teleporting in from the other dimension, constantly.

There was a stream of plasma from above, and Sonic briefly looked to find both Nuts and Tails, clinging to the ceiling beams, picking off targets below, Tails seemingly watching his twin's back while Nuts picked off targets of opportunity.

_Dammit Tails, why are you still here?!_

Still, under Nuts' protection... Sonic felt confident his brothers would be okay.

The hedgehog launched himself into a spin dash, smashing through the monsters at stupid speeds, bouncing from another computer station and shooting into the maw of an approaching Cacodemon... only to burst through the other side, covered in the monster's gore, the creature exploding into chunks as its internal gaseous system was ruptured.

Sonic landed easily on his feet, shaking himself free of giblets, and noted that the demons were finally beginning to retreat, the small vicious creatures vanishing in flashes of red. The hedgehog, despite the predicament, grinned triumphantly as he watched the Doomslayer finish beating one demon to death with the lower half of another demon, and the last few surviving monsters wisped away.

"Yeah!!" The hedgehog cried, "You better run, uglies!!!"

Before he could celebrate any further, a much _larger_ portal flickered into existence in the very middle of the lab, right beneath the hulk of the downed Egg-Robo Ultra. Seemingly being powered by the fallen Mech's power core, the tear in space steadied... and from it, several very large, very muscular creatures emerged, giant fists readied and fanged maws snarling beneath eyeless, domed heads.

"Woah! That's no good!" The hedgehog zipped forward and hopped into the Slayer's shoulders, the human barely keeping himself from instinctively tearing the hedgehog from his armour as Sonic pointed to the new arrivals. "Hey, Doomie!" The hedgehog cried, "I hope you got a plan to deal with these guys!!"

The Slayer seemed to chuckle, and Sonic clung to his shoulders as the human's shotgun fizzled into red energy... and in its place, a very bulky weapon, pulsing with green light, materialized. 

"The BFG Nine-Thousand," Vega said helpfully, "The Slayer's most powerful weapon."

Sonic smirked. "Think that'll do the job?"

"Allow us to demonstrate, 'little buddy'."

Sonic plugged his fingers in his ears and screwed his eyes as the Slayer clamped down on the trigger... and released a pulsating green blob of energy, directed right at the gang of monstrous demons that stomped from the broiling gateway. The monsters screeched as their insides were nuked... before they each simultaneously vanished in huge explosions of meat and gore, giblets fountaining away to rain down on the surrounding battlefield.

Sonic opened his eyes to inspect the destruction, and allowed a hum of approval. "Yeah! That'll do it!"

The hedgehog hopped down from the Slayer's shoulders and hit the deck as the two foxes fluttered down to meet them, gobs of charred meat and bone and organs smacking down like rain.

"So..." gasped Tails, eyes wide as he surveyed the destruction, "Did... did we win?"

"Negative..." replied Vega. "

" _Shit,_ " groaned Nuts, "I knew you were gonna say that..."

................................................................

"The Hell portals activated by the Doctor cannot be shut down from this location," Vega explained, while Nuts and Tails dragged the delirious Robotnik across the deck, "We must journey into the Hell dimension, and destroy the source there."

"Of course we do..." Nuts muttered, dropping the doctor harshly to the floor. He gestured at the fat, wriggling man with his rifle. "So... what do we do with him?"

Sonic and the Slayer shared a glance, each understanding what they had to do.

"You and Tails..." Vega explained further, "Will remain here and watch Doctor Robotnik. I can tap into the surrounding Argent field to tear open a portal to Hell. The Slayer and Sonic will go through to the other dimension, and will attempt to destroy the source of the invasion from the other side."

"What?"

"No WAY!!!"

"Woah, Woah guys!" Sonic held his hands out and attempted to calm the protesting foxes, "Take it easy!"

"Take it easy?! Are you _fucking_ KIDDING me, Sonic?!?"

"We want to help!" Put in Tails, stepping forward timidly yet determinedly.

"I know, Tails... and Nuts..." the hedgehog replied as carefully as he could, "But you guys... I know you two can fight, but you're still just _kids!_ And not just that, you're my _brothers..._ I can't let you follow me somewhere I... might not come back from, you get me?"

Tails simply whined in protest, while Nuts gestured to the Slayer in outrage. "Come on Green! I've trained for this!! I want to fight!!!"

The Slayer hesitated, expressionless behind his mask, before he removed his helmet with a hiss. He tucked the protective headgear under one arm and took a knee, reaching out and clapping his apprentice on the shoulder.

"N... No..." The human managed to rumble, steely blue eyes boring into him, "You stay."

Nuts glared at the human, utterly appalled. "No! I'm coming with you!!"

The Slayer just shook him by the shoulder and returned to his feet, setting his helmet back where it belonged. "Stay," The human croaked again, his shotgun re-materializing in his hands.

"Opening a portal now..." Vega chimed, a familiar rippling blue portal blossoming into existence a short ways away.

"Do me a solid, guys?" Sonic said wearing his usual lopsided grin, "Don't get up to any mischief while we're gone!"

The Slayer turned and hopped through the portal, disappearing in a flash of blue. Sonic gave a final wink and turned around, following his large green companion.

"Sonic..." Tails whimpered after his brother, before looking to his twin. "Nuts, what do we do?"

Nuts, tears in his eyes and pissed as Hell, clenched his fists and grit his teeth.

"Watch Eggman…" the armoured fox growled, before his tails rotated into a hyper-fast spin, and he launched himself like a rocket toward the portal.

"Nuts!!" Tails watched helplessly as the green and orange streak just managed to make his way through the portal... before the interdimensional rift closed with a flicker of electricity, leaving Tails alone with the whimpering form of Robotnik.

"No..." Tails, ears drooping and mouth agape in disbelief, briefly reached out in pure instinct, allowing his hand to fall limp as his brothers were cut off in another dimension entirely.

His ears perked as he heard frantic weeping, the sound of boots across steel... and the fox turned to find Doctor Robotnik, soiled and insane with the knowledge of his transgressions, bolting through the debris and corpses for a nearby blast door.

"Oh no you don't!" Tails growled determinedly, fists clenched as his namesakes began to rotate, "You big fat _shit!_ "

...........................................................

Nuts found himself struggling to get to his feet, having crashed to a halt in hard dirt and gritty stone... before a large hand gripped him and a furious growl accompanied as he was wrenched to an upright position.

The Slayer glared at him from behind his visor, and Nuts cowered as he felt the human's rage directed at him.

 _"STAY!!!"_ The Slayer growled, the command more a snarl than an actual word.

"Hey dudes..." Sonic stood right in between the two armoured fighters, ready to break up any physical confrontation that might occur. "Let's not get stupid, okay?"

"This is my world..." Nuts whimpered, trying to fight back tears, "I won't stay behind..."

There was a horribly tense moment... before the Slayer's fury subsided, and he released his apprentice with a frustrated snarl. 

"Hey," Sonic gave his brother a shake, "You okay little buddy?"

Nuts wiped at his eyes and nodded, tightening his grip around his rifle. "Just... just like old times, huh?" he managed a shaky grin, "You and me saving the world?"

Sonic punched his brother lightly on the pauldron. "You should've stayed back... what about Tails?"

"Don't worry," Nuts replied, "I know better than anyone... Tails can take care of himself."

"My sensors indicate that the Demons are preparing to defend the source of the Argent invasion," Vega announced, the Slayer turning back to face the Mobians. "There should be no further attacks on your world... unless we fail in our mission."

"That's not gonna happen, robo-dude!" Sonic replied, hopping onto a nearby rock to observe his surroundings. There wasn't much to see from this position, just the walls of a small canyon, the black husks of dead trees, and...

Bones, scattered and melded into the floor of the canyon. They looked human, but Sonic couldn't be sure.

The Slayer grunted, before handing a spare power pack to his apprentice. Nuts nodded at the gesture, taking the pack and slipping it into his equipment pouch.

"We must move quickly..." Vega continued, "Now the gates have been opened, we will be unable to prevent the invasion if we wait too long."

"You heard the man!" Sonic said loudly, hopping from his rock, "Let's move, soldiers!!!"

Nuts and the Slayer briefly glanced to one another, before moving after the speeding 'hog.

.........................................................

Hell.

So this was Hell.

Slabs of black rock, seas of molten fire, ancient spires wreathed with dark red magicks, a blood red sky filled with toxic clouds and the silhouettes of distant flying continents... and bones.

Countless trillions of bones, littering the Hellscape. Not to mention fresher corpses, impaled on spikes, roasting over flames, encased in torturous cages, splayed on racks, ripped, torn, tortured.

"We are nearing the source of the Argent Tear..." Announced Vega, as the trio hopped over a great bottomless cavern of flame, floating platforms offering them footing. The terrain was utterly treacherous, nothing but pits of acid, spikes, bottomless falls, geysers of molten lava... and overhead, the spindly forms of gargoyles and bloated hulks of Cacodemons floated through the rippling red sky, on the hunt for smaller prey, seemingly ignorant of the intruders below. 

Sonic hopped over a river of glowing green slime, his platforming skills honed by years of navigating the oddball terrain of Mobius and confounding Robotnik lairs, landing easily on his feet on the opposite shore. He tried not to wince as an ancient skull crumbled beneath his feet.

"Jeez, guys..." the hedgehog muttered, as a vicious keeing wail echoed from the distance, "You do this every day?!"

Nuts fluttered to a landing with his twin tails, while Doomguy opted to simply slam into the ground and demolish a pile of bones.

"He does," Nuts gestured to the Slayer, grimacing as he took in his surroundings, hands tight around his plasma rifle, "This is my first time though..."

The Slayer stomped over to the two mobians, an oversized plasma rifle of his own resting on one shoulder.

"The Slayer wishes to know how you are keeping?" Vega said politely, as the human cocked his head.

Sonic took a quick look around the canyon they presently inhabited, spines raised at the very feel of the place, before his grim expression faded and fell into a lopsided grin. "Hey, no sweat Doomie!" The hedgehog offered the Slayer a confident thumbs up, "Just show us where the uglies are at, and we'll be back in time for chili dogs!"

The Slayer looked toward Nuts, who appeared to have frozen for a moment, gripping his weapon tight as his ears pinned.

"Nuts?" The human managed to grumble, still incapable of much more than a brief grunt. However, the growl was enough to catch the fox's attention, constricted blue eyes swivelling to meet the Slayer's visor.

Nuts swallowed his nerves, and offered a timid grin. "Yeah... just lead the way... Doomie!"

The Slayer paused for a moment, before releasing a harsh bark of a laugh, hefting his weapon in both hands and stomping off over the blackened and charred Hellscape.

"Seriously..." Sonic said as they hopped over bones and black rocks in pursuit of the heavily armed demon-hunter, "You doing okay there, Tails?"

Nuts' ears pinned and he briefly seemed out of touch for a moment, before remembering his old nickname. "I'll be fine..." he replied, licking his lips, "when we kill whatever it is that killed my world..."

"We're gonna stop that though, right?" Sonic frowned, the two brothers easily capable of holding a conversation at this relatively slow pace, "Put everything back to the way it was?"

Nuts wore a grim expression, eyes scanning his surroundings. "I dunno, Sonic..." The Sentinel apprentice replied, before turning to his brother and scowling. "Hey, shouldn't you be a little more freaked out by this? We're literally in _Hell_ , and you just seem like it's business as usual!"

Sonic raised his palms in a shrug. "Honestly buddy? I'm shitting my pants!"

Nuts grinned despite himself. "You don't wear pants, numbnuts!"

"Touche'..." The hedgehog allowed his grin to falter as he considered. "Yeah, this is scary..." he continued, the grin returning sheepishly, "But I'm Sonic the Hedgehog! Being snarky, being cool, saving the world... it's kinda what I do!"

"Have you always cussed, too?"

"Not in front of the kiddies!" Sonic winked, his usual good humour returning to bury his apparent fear.

"Nuts, Sonic..." Vega's artifical voice reached them from a short ways beyond, where the Doomslayer crouched on one knee at the edge of a crevice, "I believe we have discovered the source of the invasion..."

The two brothers shared a grim look, before trotting over to join the Slayer at his perch.

"Holy _shit_..." muttered Nuts, gripping his weapon tight.

"Well..." Sonic replied, spines raising instinctively, "That's some welcoming party!"

Below them, in a huge crater littered with titanic skulls and bones, seemingly thousands of demons of every kind swarmed over each other, some sparring, some hunting, some standing careful watch... each and every one of them surrounding an enormous, fleshy, wormlike mass of flesh and bone and tentacles, planted to the craggy rock with thick muscular roots... a huge fanged maw atop the trunk of the creature, with the pod of an exposed brain at the very xenith.

"Tails..." Sonic murmured, reaching over to nudge his prone brother, "Is that... Chaos?!"

"If it is..." Nuts muttered back, "I have no idea how it got here..."

"Scanning..." Vega said quietly, as the Slayer checked his weapons, "This creature appears to be composed both of Hell energy... and the Chaos energy from your world. It appears to be out of sync with... either of our timelines. I cannot explain in great detail. Its existence defies logic."

"Green?" Nuts muttered, the human barely tilting his head in response, "Do you think... that's why we could never locate the heart of the invasion? Because... we had to come back _here_ and now... to destroy it?"

The Slayer turned his face toward Nuts, and the fox could just about make out the incredulous frown on the human's face.

"An interesting, if flawed, theory," Replied Vega, "However, at this present time it is moot. I believe an invasion of Mobius is inevitable, so long as this creature remains alive."

"Well," Nuts grumbled, "I guess we gotta find a way to make it _not_ alive."

The Slayer nodded, looking to his comrades.

"Sonic, the Slayer wishes you to provide support while he fights through to the creature. Your speed will be invaluable in keeping the demons off of us."

Sonic smirked and offered a salute. "No sweat, Doomie!"

"Nuts..." You will stay back and pick of targets from long range. Your marksmanship skills will-"

"Vega, I'm not equipped for that..." Nuts replied, patting his rifle, "Full auto plasma... from this range, I might as well unzip my pants and try pissing on them. I'm coming with."

"Nuts..." Vega sounded concerned, and the Slayer lowered his visor pointedly, "It will be extremely dangerous, and-"

"I'll stick with Sonic! You know why? I'm the only guy who could ever really keep up with him! We'll keep the bastards off of you together!"

Sonic and Doomguy shared a glance, each protective of the fox they had both taken under their wing at some point in their respective lives.

The Slayer nodded, rising to his feet with a grunt, and racking his combat shotgun.

"Okay!" Sonic said, grinning to his younger brother, "let's show 'em how Sonic and Tails do it!"

"With a littlke extra firepower..." Nuts patted his rifle and grinned wolfishly, "If that's alright by you, mister Sonic 'no guns' McGee?"

"Buddy, given our current predicament?" Sonic gestured over the sea of demons and the grotesquely corrupted form of Perfect Chaos below them, "Your toys are more than welcome!"

"Affirmative," Vega spoke up, grabbing the brothers' attention, "The Slayer wishes you both good luck in your objective. Mission launch in five... four..."

"Let's do this, bud!" Sonic reached out a fist to his brother.

"Three... Two..."

"Let's kick some ass, big bro!" Nuts gleefully bumped his own fits with Sonic's.

"One..."

At that, the Slayer launched from his perch toward the crater below, followed closely by his unlikely companions, ready to fight.

......................................

It wasn't just the small demons this time. Not just Imps, or Gargoyles, or the odd Cacodemon. The Corrupted Chaos at the heart of the invasion had all of Hell's 'natural' variety of demons defending it, and it was the thickest fighting Sonic and Tails had ever found them in.

Luckily, they had the Unchained Predator to keep most of the abominations 'entertained', while they pursued their own targets.

Sonic hopped into the air, spinning into a ball, and slammed like a cannonball between a dozen of the scrambling, hissing creatures, reducing them to pulped flesh with little effort. He landed in a ball, spinning like a buzzsaw, utilizing his forward momentum to charge straight into the gut of a morbidly obese creature with flaming cannons for arms. The thing wheezed, spittle flying from its fanged maw, before its intestines ruptured and imploded with putrid gases.

Sonic landed on his feet and kept running, briefly blinded by the blood and gore that covered his fur at this point. he tried to wipe demon fluid from his eyes at full speed, almost tripping, while a squadron of hyper-fast snakelike demons kept pace with him. He yelped and flipped away as one of the whipcord-thin amalgamates of serpent and metal whipped at him with fiery chains... before a blue-white explosion blossomed at the centre of the snake-demons.

The creatures were knocked to their bellies, stunned, as Nuts hovered above like a hummingbird, pouring fire from his modified plasma rifle. The fox produced a grenade from his belt and lobbed it, the detonation reducing some of them to giblets, before he swooped down from the air like a bird of prey, tucking into a ball at the last second, and delivered a powerful spin-dash to the remaining serpent. The fleshy torso of the thing was pulped by the particular mobian attack, before Nuts unfurled, landed easily on his feet, and put more white-hot bolts of energy into smaller demons that began to retreat from the two brothers.

"Still know the old tricks, huh?" Sonic grinned as they boosted back into a sprinting pace, searching for more enemies.

"Hey, I learned from the best!" Nuts replied, toes just brushing the surface of the Hellscape as his tails thrust him forward, reloading his plasma rifle as he flew alongside Sonic. A huge blast of green energy signalled another BFG 9000 detonation, as well as the end of another horde of demons. Most of the creatures were pouring into the centre of their destruction, as the Slayer tore through the minions of Hell with his particular brand of decorum.

"Woah!" Cried Sonic, the two brothers pausing at the crest of a small incline as they looked down to the carnage below, "What the heck are those things?!"

They watched as the Slayer ripped through another group of fodder demons, and dashed away from a trio of huge horned, bison-like monsters, each wielding flaming swords for arms.

"Hell Barons! Very Bad News!" Nuts replied, "Come on! We have to help!!"

"Whatever you say, buddy!"

Nuts hopped back into the air, propelling himself toward the fight while Sonic grinded his way down the slope on the bark of an ancient dead tree that made for a convenient 'snowboard'. 

Below, the Slayer fired away with his chaingun, multiple barrels glowing red hot as hails of tungsten rounds poured from the weapon. The Hell Barons before him lunged again, each mighty beast ravenous for his flesh, the ground shaking and splitting and crackling with Hellish energies as the Slayer fought to smite the creatures.

His weapon clicked. Ammunition dry. 

He checked his HUD, assessing the fuel pips in his chainsaw. He had enough.

With a roar that matched that of his favoured close-combat weapon, the Slayer boosted to the left with his armour thrusters, clambering onto a ridge as the Barons' below dumbly tried to match his speed. He snarled with rage and the chainsaw roared as he leapt toward the nearest beast, boots planting either side of its maw, and drove the weapon right into its skull.

The beast screeched in agony as the slayer clove its head in two, still writhing as both halves of its skull flopped away from the other, and the Slayer launched himself away from the dying monster with a mighty kick from his boot. His armour thrusters stabilised him in mid air as he allowed the chainsaw to dematerialize into his matter storage system, and his chaingun reformed in his hands once again. His armour absorbed the energy bleeding from the dying Baron, converting it into material to heal his body, repair his armour... and refill his weapons. The chaingun, fully reloaded and in perfect condition, spooled up again as the other two Barons clambered over their dead comrade.

However, the Slayer's attention was divided as a stupidly large horde of fodder demons, Imps, Gargoyles, Possessed, the lot, poured between the Barons' legs in a veritable tide of corrupted flesh and snapping jaws, all hungering for the bones of the Hellwalker himself. The Slayer had no choice but to spray his weapon over the tide, reducing many to pulped flesh and bone and giblets, as he edged himself backward to give him more space.

Dammit. He _hated_ running backwards.

"Hey! Uglies!!"

The Slayer, slowly being forced back by the tide, suddenly found himself joined by his two comrades as Sonic and Nuts thumped beside him.

"Hey, Doomguy!" Sonic cried, "What's all this 'running backwards' thing you got going on? I thought you were tough!"

"Not the time, Sonic!!" Nuts growled, raising his weapon and firing at the tide.

Sonic shrugged. "Okay, guess if _somebody's_ gotta lead the charge, it's gonna be me!"

"Wait, wh-"

Before either Sentinel could react, the blue hedgehog dropped into a roll, and defying all laws of physics, began spinning like a circular saw. The spinning intensified, building up and up, until the hedgehog let go and launched himself like a spiky blue nuclear missile right into the horde of approaching demons.

The impact sent dozens of them flying into the air, reduced to disembodied limbs and body parts, and the monsters suddenly found themselves contending with a hyper-fast pinball in their midst.

The Slayer grunted with approval and clapped Nuts on the shoulder, before leaning into a sprint and charging headlong into the demons. Nuts followed close, boosting into the air with his spinning tails, directing streams of energy into the beasts below. 

A monstrous screech reached his ears and the fox found himself facing a pack of Cacodemons, wide fanged maws gaping, hungry to consume.

Nuts, hovering like an attack helicopter, fired a stream of plasma into the closest, popping the spherical beast's singular eyeball and melting the brains within. The thing screeched as it died, and plummeted toward the ground.

Nuts swore loudly as his weapon overheated, and he slung it over his back as another Cacodemon floated dangerously close. The thing would swallow him whole if he wasn't careful.

The fox spun his tails, boosting up and over the creature, moving faster than the thing could contend with, and planted himself on the top of its 'head', gripping onto the surrounding crown of horns. Nuts crawled over the monster like an insect, reaching into his grenade pouch. He pulled the pin of the explosive, plopped it into the thing's hungry maw, and kicked away back into the air.

The Cacodemon appeared bewildered for a moment, before a dull _whump_ came from inside... and its innards ruptured and it exploded into chunks, giblets raining down on the battle below.

Nuts flinched as he felt explosions ripple behind him, and he swung around mid air to find the third Cacodeomn, horribly close to consuming him while his back was turned, completely gutted and smoking from huge craters in its underside, falling away to the ground. Nuts followed the thin trails of smoke to find the Slayer, rocket launcher in hand, give him a brief thumbs-up.

Nuts returned the gesture, but was to late. The Slayer had already turned to begin mulching more demons with his chaingun, while Sonic pinballed between the demons at his back, covering the Slayer as he did his work.

Nuts, twin tails beginning to ache with exertion, swooped down to the fight and planted himself between Sonic and the Slayer, retrieving his slung rifle as he landed.

"Damn..." groaned Sonic, attempting to shake further gore from himself, "I'm gonna need a _hell_ of a shower when this is over..."

"That's what you get..." Nuts grunted, pumping another stun bomb into the charging demons, "For not wearing armour!"

"Hey!" Sonic cried back, jumping into the air and kicking a nearby exploive barrel into a crowd of ancient Possessed. The things were reduced to giblets as the hedgehog landed back on his feet. "This hedgehog's too handsome to cover up like you do!"

"Hey, are you calling me ugly?!"

"Hey, you said it! Not me!"

"Now now, boys..." Vega chipped in, while the Slayer carved through another Imp with his chainsaw, restocking his ammunition supplies with the spilled Hell energy, "Get along, or we're turning this life-or-death mission to save the world around right now and going home!"

"Sorry, _mom!_ " came both brothers' simultaneous reply, as the Slayer clapped his helmet in annoyance at Vega's inclusion in the banter.

Eventually, after much ripping, tearing, spin-dashing and firing, the tide of lesser demons subsided, and the fodder creatures began to retreat, cut down with blasts from the Sentinels' weapons as they ran for their miserable lives.

Which just left the two Hell Barons, furious at their minions' failure to exterminate the intruders, to screech bone-shaking battle cries and storm forward, twin swords flaming, to finish them off.

The Slayer's chaingun vanished in a flash of red, almost instantaneaously replaced with his chainsaw, and he gestured furiously toward the approaching behemoths.

"Okay, little buddy!" Sonic cried to Nuts, "Let's see if we can take out ours before Doomie!"

Nuts grimaced and charged with his brother, the pair splitting up to confuse the slavering demon. Sonic curled into a ball and slamed into the creature's legs repeatedly, causing the monster to buckle, the behemoth lashing out with its twin flaming swords, slashing at thin air as the two super-speedy mobians ran circles around it. Nuts fired with his plasma rifle, the underpowered weapon nevertheless causing more distraction for the mighty demon as white hot energy chipped away at its armour. He unleashed a stun bomb as Sonic hopped away, causing the thing to quiver with electricity, falling to its knees as it staggered.

Nuts' rifle clicked and hissed as it finally ran dry. "I'm out!" He called, stowing the thing on his back.

"Looks like we're doing this the old fashioned way, little buddy!" called Sonic. Nuts nodded, a plan forming in his head, and he spun into a hover holding out his hands for Sonic. The hedgehog grabbed ahold, and Nuts boosted into the air, the Baron below screeching in triumph at its apparent victory.

It didn't last. Nuts boosted around in a wide arc, and increased the thrust of his tails until he was flying at ludicrous speeds. As they neared the beast he let go of his brother, Sonic curling into a streak of blue... and destroying the Hell Baron's head as he hit like a ballistic missile. 

The beast's body staggered, broiling red blood spewing from its neck stump, before it finally realised it was dead and slammed into the ground.

Nearby, the other Hell Baron joined its comrade, screeching as its legs were taken from beneath it, and writhing as its head was seperated from its body by the Slayer's roaring chainblade.

The trio, reunited again, stood ready to continue the fight... only to find a sea of corpses around them, the bulk of the demonic defenders reduced to dead flesh.

"Well!" Said Sonic, even now wearing his trademark lopsided grin (as well as a coating of gore) and clapping his hands, "I guess that takes care of the uglies!"

"Sure..." Nuts replied, armour streaked with red and fists clenched by his sides, "That just leaves..."

"Chaos," Finished Vega, the Slayer stomping a dying Imps' head flat as he looked to the enormous, tumourous growth that lashed with tentacles, and screeched with fury at its destroyed minions.

................................................…

"Okay..." breathed Sonic, hopping in place like a boxer psyching himself up for the next round, "how do we deal with _this_ guy?!"

The Slayer grunted, his fists clenched, visor lowered as he glared at the monstrous grotesque form of Corrupted Chaos. 

"Green?" Nuts sidled up beside his big green friend, looking up to his mentor with big bloodstained eyes from a bloodied face, "what do we do?"

The Slayer turned and considered his two smaller friends, the fox's face set in determination while the hedgehog offered him a shaky thumbs-up.

The human processed his options, shooting his thoughts to Vega.

"The Slayer wishes..." Vega announced, "That you two remain here. He will assault the objective alone."

"What?! No!" Nuts cried, punching his mentor on the leg guard, "we're coming with-"

"It is not a question," Vega went on, as red energy crackled in the Slayer's hands... and he briefly juggled his most powerful weapon with intent. "You would do well to stay out of the way of a high-power BFG 9000 detonation."

"Yeah, robo-dude. I think we would..." Sonic said, stepping forward and clapping Nuts on the shoulder, "Don't worry, buddy... I think Doomie has this one!"

The Slayer offered the hedgehog a thumbs-up, before removing his pistol from his holster and handing it to his apprentice. Then he reached up with his free hand, removed his helmet... and handed that to Nuts as well.

Nuts looked to the helmet in his hands, puzzled, ears drooping as he looked back to the Slayer. "Green? What's... what are you doing?" 

"In the unlikely event that the Slayer should not return from this fight..." Vega explained, "I will transport you both back to your world. You will remain here, and defend yourselves until then if necessary."

"Dude..." Nuts said, "There's no _way_ you're not coming back! Right?"

The Slayer smirked and kneeled down, extending a fist to his protégé. Nuts reached out and exchanged the bump, the Slayer wiggling his fingers as he stood.

"Give 'em Hell, Doomie!" Sonic said, winking at his larger companion.

The Slayer checked his massive weapon and nodded, scarred face turning to stone as he turned toward his enemy. Without so much as another grunt, the human bowed his head and lunged forward, fat boots pounding into the craggy ground of Hell.

...........................................................................

Sonic and Nuts looked on as the Slayer, faster than any mortal human ever could, sprinted toward the enormous form of Corrupted Chaos, the vile beast screeching as it lashed out with tentacles and spewed volleys of acidic bile at its assailant. 

The Slayer, with eons of practiced ease, nimbly dodged the attacks, switching between his arsenal of weapons as he chipped away at armour, blew apart acid tubes, blasted away tentacles and extra eyes and snapping mouths with bullets and rockets and plasma.

The monster screeched in pain and fury as the human lunged for a downed tentacle, grabbing on tight and swinging himself up onto the appendage, running up its length like walking a thick, tumorous tightrope.

Other tentacles slashed at the man as he clambered up the beast as though it were a giant tree, missing each time, tearing chunks out of its own flesh, the otherworldly screeching like a chorus of tortured souls punishing the spectators' ears.

"Look!" Nuts cried, releasing one hand from an ear to point, "He's at the top!!"

Sonic watched as the human wrenched himself _into_ the beast's gaping maw, steadying himself against a giant tooth as his weapon began to glow with power.

"He's got it!" Sonic grinned, "better close your eyes little-"

The beast screeched once more, cutting the hedgehog off... as it slammed a cluster of tentacles into its mouth, reared its head... and swallowed the slayer whole.

 _"NO!!!"_ Nuts screamed, clambering forward, teeth bared and pistol raised as though the small weapon could do anything. _"YOU MOTHER FUCKER!!!!!"_

"TAILS!" Sonic wrenched him back, the pit of his stomach dropping as he realised what had happened, "Don't be STUPID!!!"

_"I'LL KILL YOU, YOU PIECE OF SHIT!!! YOU FUCKING BASTARD!!!!!!!"_

"NUTS!! HE'S _GONE!!_ WE HAVE TO GET OUT OF-"

"Boys... BOYS!!!! Vega called from the Slayer's helmet, "Don't worry! It's all part of the plan!"

Sonic and Nuts looked at the helmet in confusion, before their attention was diverted by a horrific gurgling sound.

The bloated form of Corrupted Chaos began to ripple with motion. It released a grotesque, gurgling moan, as though it had consumed something that really didn't agree with it... and then tears in the flesh appeared, the creature ripping and splitting from the inside as it inflated like a balloon... until eventually it erupted in an enormous explosion of green light, a miniature sun forming in the Hell-crater, causing Sonic and Nuts to dive to the floor with their eyes covered. The shockwave from the hypercharged BFG blast washed over them like a tidal wave, rippling their fur and shaking their bones... until ultimately, all fell silent, the only sounds the wet smack of giblets raining to the Hellscape.

Slowly the brothers raised their heads, blinking stars from their eyes, dazed and confused by the blast. The screams of dying demons echoed in the distance, any surviving fodder creatures meeting their final demise at the death of their master.

"Dude..." Sonic said dryly, a small giblet going unnoticed as it bounced from his head, "I... told you he got it..."

The two siblings slowly climbed to their feet, taking in the destruction. The Corrupted Chaos was just _gone_ , nothing left but a glowing stump, the ground surrounding it reduced to sparkling glass. The last few cries of expiring demons died out, leaving the immediate Hellscape eerily quiet.

And from the centre of the devestation, objective complete, the scowling armoured form of the Unchained Predator marched forth, BFG 9000 steaming, ready to head back to his ship to prepare for the next mission.


	10. The End

Stupid. He was so, _so_ stupid.

"You had one job, Tails..." the fox muttered to himself as he paced the abandoned laboratory, wandering in circles beneath the shattered hulk of the Egg-Robo, "ONE!!! Watch Robotnik! And what did you do?! You let him _escape!!"_ He flopped down on the broken hull of a dead Egg-bot and stared moodily through the lab floor. "The guys are gonna be disappointed in me..."

He sat in silence, contemplating his failure to secure the defeated doctor... until a harsh crackling noise perked his ears, and he jerked in fright. Tails raised his borrowed pistol, scanning for threats, as space warped before him with lightning whips of crackling light. 

Miles recoiled as a familiar blue whirling portal opened in the abandoned lab, hissing with unnatural energies, a small roiling black hole... from which emerged three victorious, blood-soaked, battle-weary figures.

"SONIC!!" Tails ran forward and violently wrapped his bloodied brother in a tight hug, Sonic reeling back with the force of his little brother's embrace as Tails began sobbing with relief.

"Hey, easy buddy! Easy!!" He hugged his little brother back, lifting him from the floor of the abandoned lab.

Nuts watched the display of emotion, arms hanging limply by his sides.

"It's done..." He said lightly, voice barely a croak as he looed up at his mentor, "Isn't it?"

"Affirmative..." Vega replied, the Slayer clutching his helmet beneath one arm, "Demonic invasion is no longer viable at this time."

"It's really over..." Nuts muttered. The Slayer kneeled down and clapped the fox's shoulder, offering a brief smirk from his scarred face.

"Yes. However..." The Synthetic Intelligence went on, "I recommend we seek and destroy any remaining Argent technology in this base. Scuttle anything that could be used to bore a gateway back to the Hell dimension."

"Well, Doomguy…" Sonic said, one arm wrapped around his little brother's shoulder, "You got any juice left in that big freaking gun of yours?"

The Slayer smirked, replacing his helmet where it belonged, and retrieved his BFG 9000 from its space in his armour's matter storage.

"I think we can take care of it..." Nuts said, checking his pistol.

Then let's get to work!" Sonic, ever unflappable, headed off to check the base computers with his little brother in tow, Nuts and the Slayer ready to demolish any piece of Argent tech they could find.

….....................................................

Despite the Slayer being all business, and Nuts taking after his mentor... Sonic had insisted on a post-victory feast for the triumphant demon-slaying team, hosted aboard the Fortress of Doom. The Slayer's sanctuary was littered with boxes of pizza, plates of chili dogs, cans of soda for the younger ones and beers for the immortal Slayer.

Nuts had been happy to show Tails the technology aboard the ship, under the singular direction that the younger fox touch _nothing_ , while Sonic and the Doomguy checked out the human's collection of artefacts from Earth, his homeworld. Fun was had, at least as much as the Slayer would allow, as the group spent an evening of rest and relaxation after literally stopping the demonic consumption of an entire planet.

Later in the 'night', Nuts broke away from the group for his own space. He wandered through the station, past rows of Night Sentinel statues, ancient portraits of old Argentia, the holographic 'records' the Slayer liked to keep around the ship in the event he wanted some tunes to listen to... eventually, the fox set himself on the main bridge, computer consoles blinking silently, the holographic image of Monius slowly rotating in the air above.

"Well, Ames..." The fox muttered, clutching a can of soda, "I did it... I went back in time, went to Hell... saved the world...only question now is where do I go from here?"

"Well," His ears perked as a voice responded from behind, "I guess that's up to you... little buddy."

Nuts turned to find Sonic approaching, drink in hand, fur shiny and clean after scrubbing himself free of the collected gore in the Fortress' cleaning facilities.

"Who're you talking to, dude?" The hedgehog said, setting himself down beside his brother.

Nuts shrugged. "Dunno. Crazy, remember?"

Sonic grinned, though it didn't quite reach his eyes. "Y'know, dude... after all that? I get it. I get why you are the way... well, you are. No offense, dude."

Nuts snorted. "None taken. I know I'm missing a good few marbles."

"That's not what I meant, little buddy." Sonic replied, nudging his brother on the shoulder. "I just meant... I get why you're so much different to... well, _Tails..._ after fighting against _that._ "

Nuts just stared into space. "I guess I stopped being him a long time ago..." he muttered darkly, sloshing his drink in its can.

The two brothers stared up at the holographic representation of their homeworld, remaining silent as they took in the uncorrupted sphere of their planet.

"So," said Sonic, breaking the sudden ice, "What are you gonna do?"

"I dunno…" Nuts replied, rotating a twinge in his gauntleted right arm, "I never really planned this far ahead..."

"Well..." Sonic said, "There's always room back home? For another brother?"

Nuts thought for a moment, before shaking his head. "Nah. There's still a lot of Demons left out there... a lot of worlds to save... besides, after everything that's happened, I don't think I'll fit in a _normal_ society right now. I'm a little too busted for that."

Sonic nodded sadly. "You ever gonna come back?" 

Again, Nuts considered. "Some day..." the fox took a swig of his soda, turning away from the image of his homeworld. "Some day."

...…..........................................................

The morning came, or as near as 'morning' could get on board a battle station, and the group had assembled to say their goodbyes.

"Well, guys..." Sonic said, grinning at his two hosts, "It's been fun, but I guess we gotta go!"

"Fun?" Tails said questioningly, "Fun, yes. That's a word..."

"An _interesting_ way to describe our activities, yes..." agreed Vega. "Coordinates are set, portal is ready to go when you are."

"Okay..." Nuts, fully clad in his usual green fatigues and utility belt, stepped over to bid his brothers goodbye. "I guess I'll see you guys around..." He frowned and wore a serious expression. "You _will_ take care of Robotnik, right?"

"Hey, you know us!" Sonic said, grinning broadly. "ol' egghead's as good as scrambled!"

"You will come back, right?" Tails said, ears drooping as he gawped up at his recently acquired twin.

Nuts gave him a thumbs-up. "Sure! Just got a few... thousand more axes to grind, is all!" He reached out a hand and Tails accepted it, the two foxes exchanging a shake... before Tails pulled into an awkward hug.

"Okay, dude..." Nuts said uncertainly, patting the slightly shorter fox's back, "Kinda weird but... okay!"

"I thought you said we were different people now?"

"Yeah... yeah, sure thing, dude."

The two foxes released their embrace, Nuts finishing by offering a light punch to his twin's arm, before the Sentinel apprentice turned to his older brother.

This time, the two brothers didn't hesitate before entering a tight embrace, almost squishing the breath out of one another.

"Be careful, okay little buddy?" Sonic said as they released the hug.

"I'm literally training to fight demons..." Nuts snorted, "But yeah, I'll try. You too, Sonic!"

Sonic winked. "Always!" The hedgehog turned to the Slayer, who had for the whole exchange remained silent. "See ya around, Doomguy! Keep doing that... ripping and tearing thing that you do!"

The Slayer responded with a quick flurry of signs, which Nuts didn't understand but nevertheless brought a grin to the hedgehog's face.

"I _always_ go fast, dude!" Sonic laughed. He then turned to his younger brother, and took Tails by the shoulder. "Come on, little dude. Time to go."

The two other mobians headed for the transportation pad, as the warp portal blossomed into existence.

Sonic and Tails took a brief glance back, the Slayer offering a short wave to the fox. Tails returned it uncertainly, before Sonic gave him a nudge, and the two brothers vanished through the portal, back to their preserved homeworld.

.................................................................

Sonic whistled as he wandered through Tails' workshop, rounding the gleaming red form of his old Tornado as he clutched a pair of sodas. 

"Hey! Tinker!"

There was a muffled yelp as Tails, currently situated beneath the plane, presumably smacked himself on something at Sonic's voice. Sonic grinned as he approached the orange fox-boy, Tails sliding out from beneath the plane and scowling as he rubbed his head.

"Sonic... what the _fuck?!_ "

"Hey, hey!" Sonic said, pointing toward the fox, "That language is unsuitable for kids of your age!"

"I'm _twelve_ , Sonic... I'm not a little kid any more!"

"I have strict orders to keep you innocent and sweet for as long as mobianly possible!" The hedgehog replied cheerily. "Besides... my house, my rules little buddy!"

"Well yeah?" Tails replied, "My workshop, my rules!"

"My plane, my rules!"

"My wrench..." Tails said, hefting a large blunt tool like a club, "My rules!"

"Ooh!" Sonic teased, handing the fox his soda, "Think you're a big tough guy, huh?"

"Sonic, we both know that given the correct circumstances, I totally _can_ be!"

"Sure..." Sonic said dryly, sipping his drink, "But hopefully you won't have to be. Not for a while, at least."

The two brothers sat in silence, Tails noting that Sonic's good humour had soured a little.

"You okay, Sonic?" the young fox said, ears drooping with worry, "You seem a little down..."

Sonic, a little too slowly, regained his usual lopsided grin and nudged his brother on the arm. "Nah, I'm fine dude! Just hungry, is all!" the hedgehog stood and left his brother to it, heading for the workshop's small kitchen. "You want something to eat while I'm at it?"

"Nah, I'll grab something when I'm done here. Thanks, though!"

"No worries, dude!"

Sonic left the workshop and went for the refrigerator as he entered the kitchen, searching for something to settle his stomach.

He wasn't particularly hungry. But he couldn't shake the... images. Of snapping maws and pallid flesh and rivers of blood and magma and writhing tentacles and-

Yeah, Sonic understood why his brother from another time was the way he was. Maybe just eating something would help clear his head. Distract him from the nightmares.

Sonic set a plate of cooked sausages onto the counter, accompanied by a hot dog bun and bottle of chili sauce. He'd knock up a dish of his own chili dogs. Leave some aside for Tails. He grabbed another soda and cracked it open, chugging at the sugary drink inside.

"Y'know... that stuff's real bad for you..."

Sonic almost spat his mouthful of soda all over the counter at the sudden, raspy voice. He wiped his mouth on the back of his hand and turned... looking up as his eyes met the fully armoured form of an adult, twin-tailed mobian fox.

Sonic looked over the mobian with fascination, the orange face of the armoured fox streaked with brown, blue eyes regarding the hedgehog with amusement.

"Nuts?" Sonic managed to say, a smirk playing at the side of his mouth as he tried to calculate how much _older_ his other brother was.

The fox grinned wolfishly. "Miss me?" He spoke, his voice deeper and raspier now he was fully grown, "Little buddy?"

Sonic flapped his mouth open in a wide grin. "Hey!" the hedgehog laughed, "Don't get any ideas, _old man!_ "

"I prefer the term 'distinguished'..." Nuts replied, fat boots stomping into the kitchen floor as he crossed... and grabbed the hedgehog in a crushing, one-armed hug.

"How you doing, you little _shit?_ " Nuts said gleefully in that oddball accent and foreign cussing, "I missed you, dude!!"

"ACK! Nuts, don't squish your older brother!"

"Oh, sorry..." The taller fox dropped Sonic back to his feet, setting one hand on an armoured hip, the other resting on the butt of a large double-barrel shotgun holstered at his hip. "It's just... been a while, is all. For me, anyway."

Sonic brushed off his fur and looked the armoured fox over curiously. "How long?"

Nuts frowned and scratched the back of his head, calculating. "Uh... well, it's all kinda screwy when you jump around time and space as often as we do... and calculating for Earth years to Mobian years..." He paused for a second and then shrugged. "Fifteen years?"

"Fifteen _years?!_ " Sonic said with disbelief. "What took you so long?"

"Hey, can't a guy get caught up in his work? Been kinda busy, dude." The fox grinned for a moment, before it subsided into a sheepish smirk. "Also... I never really felt like I belonged here any more... the Tails I was died a real long time ago, and... I didn't wanna intrude or anything..."

"You were always welcome..." Sonic said, "what changed your mind?"

Nuts shrugged. "I just figured... it was time to come back. I _did_ promise, after all!"

"That you did, _little bro!_ " Sonic opened the fridge and handed Nuts a soda. "Drink?"

"Got any booze?"

"Uh, _no?_ "

"Meh. I guess this'll do." 

Sonic watched with amusement as Nuts snapped open his soda and began chugging it, the can looking small in his armoured right hand. 

"So... "Said Sonic leaning against the counter and folding his arms, "How's the big guy?"

"Who, _Doomie?_ " the two brothers chuckled, "Same as... still doesn't talk much. Mostly that sign language you taught him." Nuts appeared to lean to see past Sonic, looking through in the direction of the workshop with interest. "How's the squirt?"

Sonic grinned. "He's fine! A little more... _coarse_ these days, I can't imagine why..."

"Oh well, I'm _sorry_ for expanding the kid's vocabulary."

Sonic laughed, his face morphing into a mischievous grin. "He's doing some work on the Tornado right now..."

Nuts chuckled. "That old girl? _Shit_ dude, it's been _years..._ "

Sonic raised an eyebrow. "Wanna go see if he needs a hand?"

Nuts shuffled in place, for the first time appearing uncertain. "You think he'll mind?"

Sonic spread his arms in disbelief. "Dude! Are you kidding? how often is it a kid gets to have a demon-hunting space marine _and_ the fastest, most handsome thing alive as big brothers?!"

Nuts smirked at that, crushing his now empty soda can. "Well, when you put it that way..."

"Come on..." Sonic said, gesturing at Nuts to follow, "If we hurry, you guys _might_ have time to strip the entire airframe before evening..."

"Dude I bet we can do it _in the hour!_ "

"Sure buddy, sure... hey, Tails? Got a visitor..."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The end!! Thanks to everyone who read this, posted comments, posted Kudos, spread it around... it all motivated me to get this damn thing finished!!! Even though I really struggled to get chapters out sometimes, I enjoyed writing this story every step of the way!
> 
> This might not be the end of Nuts Blasckowikz, but I can't promise anything for sure! Maybe he'll return some day in some other fic, if I get any good ideas!!
> 
> Again, thanks!!!


End file.
